by Mike Wild
“Who are you?” the man asked slowly. His tone, civilised, patient and polite, was totally at odds with his appearance. “And what is it you are doing here?”
Old Race blood, but not Old Race, Kali decided, ignoring his question for a moment. The thought that had struck her before her fall – that some of the builders might still be alive – had never really been likely – next to impossible, actually – and now that she’d had chance to see these people close to, it only confirmed the fact. But though their origin was far more prosaic, who these people were came as only slightly less of a surprise than the alternative. Six of them in all, their garb, speech and, most of all, the crossed-circle talismans they wore pinned to their sleeves, left no doubt as to their identity. This bunch were Final Faith, members of the most pervasive, most consuming and most intolerant religion to blight the peninsula, zealots to every woman and every man.
They were not her favourite people.
That, however, was immaterial right now.
What was material was the obvious question. What the hells were the Final Faith doing in the Spiral of Kos?
The key. It seemed to be the only thing in the place so it had to be the key.
Well, if that was the case... Sorry, but she’d got here first.
“I asked you a question, girl,” the apparent leader reminded her. His tone had already hardened somewhat.
Girl? Kali thought, and stared at him. “Oh, you know,” she said innocently, “went for walk in the woods, got lost, fell down a sodding great hole...”
The man nodded then abruptly tugged her toolbelt from her waist, tipping out the contents of some of its pockets. Kali shrugged as he picked through a selection of pitons, hammers, clamps and other excavation gear, regarding her questioningly when he also came upon some marbles, a sock and a mouldy, half-eaten pie. Okay, so maybe she should have a clearout once in a while.
“Impressive tools for a walk in the woods,” Mister Nosey nevertheless concluded. He glanced over at the broken, shard-covered bodies of the stickthings, which coincidentally she seemed to have landed on or nearby. “You managed to survive three brackan, too. Equally impressive.”
Brackan, eh? Kali thought. Have to remember that. “Yeah, well, I –”
“You are intruding here!”
The statement came so suddenly and so forcefully that it threw her off guard.
“Excuse me?”
“Intruding. This... reliquary is under the jurisdiction of the Final Faith.”
“Oh, really?” Kali said, bristling. “And since when did your little glee-club extend to the Sardenne?”
The man smiled coldly. “Since my arrival here.”
Kali stared. She was only just getting over the shock that she had survived that fall – and its cause – let alone finding she had company, but one thing was already abundantly clear to her – this man was serious. And despite his superficial civility, he was dangerous. She could feel it exuding from his every pore.
The fact didn’t stop her speaking up, though. That was her trouble, people kept telling her, though it never did any good.
“Well, then – you’re a little off the beaten path, aren’t you, priest?”
The man’s hand – leather-gloved – shot out without warning and clenched itself about her neck. Kali gasped and fumbled to release its grip, but it was strong. Very strong.
The man stood, and, her throat constricting, she actually found herself being lifted from the floor.
“My name,” he told her, “is Konstantin Munch, and despite your disdain I am not one of the Enlightened Ones.” He used the phrase that described the Final Faith’s priesthood with a degree of disdain of his own, which she found peculiar. “I am, however, an agent of that church, acting on its behalf and that of the Anointed Lord, and so I ask you again – what are you doing here?”
“Actually, I... bought the place,” Kali rasped, choking. She hung a hand vaguely in the direction of the Spiral and its dead plants, twitched it. “Thought I’d open a herbalist’s emporium but... was never very... green-fingered.”
Munch’s hand tightened, the leather squeaking. “Ah, I see.”
“And you?” Kali ventured. “Mind... telling me what... you’re... kaa-hurr... doing here?”
“Actually, yes. Why don’t we just say that my friends and I were led here by the Lord of All?”
No surprise, there, Kali thought. These people did everything in his – god’s, her? Its? – name, including all the sacking, raping and pillaging, by some accounts. But Lord of All or not, something had led Munch and his mates to the Spiral’s front door, when even her map hadn’t been specific about its location. And though she found it difficult to believe, she thought she knew what.
She flicked a pained gaze – already flaring and soon to blink out, if she wasn’t careful – to the side, examining Munch’s companions again. Sure enough, the clenched fists of one of them still pulsated ever so slightly with the aftermath of energy release – the same release, presumably, that had lit up the floor of the chamber earlier. She couldn’t see much of his face beneath its hood, only that it seemed harsh, thin and sallow, but there was an overly intense penetration about the shadowed eyes that Kali had seen once before, and cared not to remember. They were the eyes of someone who would normally be denounced by the Final Faith. Eyes that stared out not only at this world but beyond, into another layer of being. Eyes that saw the threads of the universe, used them and followed them. The eyes of a –
“Shadowmage?” Munch said, sensing her recognition and puzzlement. He smiled, bobbing her dangling and struggling form almost playfully towards the mage in question. “The young lady wonders not only why we are here but why one such as I is in league with one such as you, Kallow,” he said. “Are you offended?” Turning his attention back to Kali, he added, “Unusual, I grant you, but let’s just say the Anointed Lord allows me some... latitude in my choice of companions, depending on the task she has set for me.”
“Tashk?” Kali enquired, the one word all she could manage now. She could feel her eyes bulging painfully and her tongue thick between her lips.
Munch shrugged modestly, making her bob again. “Certain errands of import – troubleshooting, damage-control, the elimination of various problems.” He smiled as he stressed the word before tossing Kali to the floor, where she scrambled back. “Whatever it is, in fact, the Anointed Lord wishes me do.”
Kali hacked rawly, rubbing her throat, trying to ignore the pounding in her skull as blood rushed back into her brain. The man had almost killed her just then, and she had little doubt that was his ultimate intent, especially as he had just brushed back his cloak to reveal a particularly vicious-looking gutting knife.
“Last chance, girl, as I have no time for inconveniences. What is it that you are doing here?”
Kali thought fast. After that little ordeal, she was still too dizzy to run and too weak to defend herself, and so the only possible way out of this was to bluff. The question was, with what? It would have helped if Munch had given her a clue as to why he and his people were here, because without that juicy tidbit it would be so easy to say the wrong thing.
But then it struck her. Why was Munch so interested in what she was doing here? Surely that was obvious? Given that he hadn’t just stumbled across the place, could it be that he’d come to the Spiral for the key without knowing what he’d find when he arrived? That he thought she knew something about the Spiral that might help? If that was the case, maybe he didn’t know everything about the key itself.
It was something she could work with. A gamble, but worth the ante. If nothing else, it would buy her time.
“All right, all right!” she coughed. “The truth is, I came here for the... romfiffelypop.”
Munch’s eyes narrowed. “The romfiffelypop?”
Kali looked at him in a way that suggested everyone knew what the romfiffelypop was, then pointed towards the Spiral. “The key, dammit! I’ve been searching for it for years.”
One of Munch’s people – a woman by the sound of it – made a pishing sound, but Munch ignored her.
“The key?” he said, evenly. “Forgive me, I have never heard it called by that name.”
Kali just knew she had him on the hook and shook her head wearily. “You wouldn’t. It’s an ancient Varondian dialect – a tribe in the Drakengrat Mountains – long extinct.” Oh, good one, she thought.
“Is it, now? I see. And you are something of an expert in these matters?”
Kali nodded. “I’ve been around a bit, seen some things.” She thought of others who did what she did, mainly blundering vandals – tomb raiders – in it solely for the money from the artefact trade. “The name’s Orlana Dawn.”
Munch pursed his lips, nodding. “Tell me, Orlana – have you experience of whirling blades, shooting spikes, rolling boulders, lava tiles and other lethal, death-dealing traps, triggers and devices?”
What? Kali thought. Was that meant to be some kind of joke? Sure, she’d come upon one or two ‘protective measures’ in her time but, for the most part, she’d had more problems with animals around the sites than anything inside them. Truth was, most contained nothing worth trapping at all.
“Why?” she asked, suspiciously. “Should I be?”
“We have encountered some such hazards recently. There is a possibility we may encounter some today.”
Kali realised he was being serious, and couldn’t help but be intrigued – where the hells had these people been? “Well, then,” she said, “I’m your man.”
Once again, the woman made a noise, but Munch silenced her with a slice of his hand. For the first time he looked Kali – openly and unashamedly – up and down. “Now,” he said, “I know you are lying.”
A lech as well as a psychopath, Kali concluded. But at least her gamble seemed to have paid off. For the moment, she would live – an extra member of Munch’s team. The fact was, she resented that immensely – the Spiral should have been hers – but, on the other hand, she’d bought herself chance to examine it properly for the first time – and maybe when she knew more she could make it hers again. It had to be better than being sliced like a rack of shnarlmeat on the floor.
Munch, his people and Kali moved off across the vast chamber floor, their way lit by a fresh flare of light from the shadowmage. As her feet crunched on crystal shards, Kali looked up at the Spiral, noting the circular runics inscribed on massive plates that ran in a ring beneath the dome, wondering for what mysterious reason the builders had put them there. The sheer scale of what the Old Races had achieved never failed to leave her in awe, and now, with the advantage of this lower perspective, she found herself staring open-mouthed and more awed than ever before. Walking through the Spiral was like walking through a cathedral, a construction of staggering proportions, but however impressive it was, its actual purpose left her puzzled – and a little troubled. Her first thought – that it was some kind of museum – didn’t really work, as what kind of museum contained only one exhibit? What, then? Some kind of memorial – but to a key? No, it had to be something else. A huge key perhaps suggested some accompanying huge vault, but then she had seen nothing here that a key such as the one atop the Spiral might open, and besides, what kind of vault, whatever its size, left the means to open it on public display?
Okay, so the place was hardly public. The point was, it didn’t make sense.
The party reached the base of the Spiral and Munch and the others stared up the towering structure, assessing it. But left feeling uneasy by her inability to pin anything down, Kali’s gaze was drawn instead to the grey remains of the plantlife that wrapped it, the nagging doubt about what she thought she’d seen earlier returning. As she watched, a tiny triangle of light – natural light – lit a patch of the lifeless tendrils and pods.
Kali looked up, blinked. The still-mottled but otherwise soil-free dome had begun to glow, the planet’s distant sun rising and shining into that one patch of the Sardenne not obscured by its dark canopy – the clearing above.
Daylight was coming to Twilight.
And with it – in tenuous shafts that must have been intruding here for the first time in long and unknown ages – to the Spiral.
Kali looked down. She couldn’t be absolutely sure but it seemed to her that the plants had stirred, as she thought they had earlier.
“Uurrmm...?” she said to the others.
Munch had apparently noticed something, too, as he had stepped back. He addressed her directly. “Did you see that, Miss Dawn?”
“I’m not sure,” Kali responded. To her eyes, the plants seemed more... fleshy, too. “It could be –”
“It’s nothing,” the woman who’d protested earlier interrupted. “A trick of the light, that’s all.”
Munch looked again, but the plants – if they had moved – were now still once more.
“You are certain?”
“Of course I’m certain,” the woman said, stripping off her hood and cloak, “or my name’s not Orlana Dawn.”
What? Kali thought. What? The woman had announced herself so casually that for a moment the name hadn’t really registered. But nonetheless Orlana Dawn stood before her now, arms folded and smiling daggers, a buxom blonde putting all the right curves into a dark silk bodysuit. It was of a kind favoured by certain members of Vos and Pontaine’s thieves guilds, which she had clearly adopted as her working gear. Kind of appropriate, really.
Still, it had a certain something. What Kali thought was: I have to get me one of those. What she said was: “Okay outfit, shame about the ass.”
She looked at Munch. He had clearly been playing games from the start, probably even knew fully what the Spiral and the key were.
“If you knew – ?”
“Why didn’t I kill you?” Munch answered. He inclined his head to the Spiral. “Frankly, because I do not know what hazards I face here, and I have lost too many people in recent months to waste an extra resource.” He sighed lengthily. “The question, therefore, is which one of you goes first?”
“Konstantin!” Orlana Dawn objected.
Another sigh. “It’s simple, Orlana. The two of you obviously share a passion for this kind of thing, but I have no idea which of you is the most competent at handling it. If I send you first, and you die, I send her in with the knowledge gained of what killed you. Or, I send her first and –”
“I get the picture,” Orlana said. She looked suspicious of him, suddenly. “If she goes first – and succeeds – do I still get paid?”
Munch shrugged. “Sadly, the funds allocated to me are limited.”
“Farking poxes from the pits! You’re a bastard, Munch, you know that?”
“This I have been told before,” Munch rumbled, unconcerned.
Their exchange faded in Kali’s ears as her gaze flicked from the tower to the dome, the dome to the tower and back again, already ahead of them and working out what she needed to know. Then it struck her. The Spiral of Kos was no museum, no memorial and no vault, it was a greenhouse – a greenhouse specifically designed around its centrepiece, not the tower but the plants. In reaching that conclusion, however, she was still left puzzled. Because in the middle of the Sardenne Forest, what possible need could there be for more plants?
Unless...
“I’ll go first,” she said, suddenly, and what she hoped was decisively. She had no interest in the money but, as much as she disapproved of Orlana Dawn’s motives for doing what she did, if her theory was right, she couldn’t let her take the risk.
“Go to hells!” Orlana Dawn hissed at her. “She’s a greenhorn, Munch.”
“Hey, who are you calling a greenhorn?” Kali objected, despite herself. “The Maze of Moans,” she cited, pointing proudly at her chest. “Me.”
Orlana Dawn stared at her, momentarily nonplussed.
“Oh, really. How about the Lost Plateau of Thurst?” she retorted, with a snort.
Kali piffed. “Couldn’t have been that lost. The Booming
Room. The Booming Room, eh?”
“Quinking’s Depths.”
“Quinking’s Depths.”
“I already said that.”
“Third level.”
“Impossible. Look, this is my job, you interfering bitch. Konstantin, this is nothing I can’t handle –”
“Miss Dawn goes first,” Munch declared, putting an end to it. “The real one, that is.” He gestured two of his people towards Kali. “In case she is tempted to help, hold the other one.”
Kali was grabbed by both arms and struggled as Orlana Dawn sighed with satisfaction. “Munch, this is a mistake,” she protested. “Orlana, don’t –”
Munch hushed her. “Bring me that key, Miss Dawn,” he ordered.
Orlana nodded, and Kali watched helplessly as her rival took one, two, then three tentative steps up the first turn of the Spiral. Even Dawn couldn’t fail to notice that the plants had filled out somewhat now beneath the strengthening rays of the sun, but other than giving them a cautionary frown she continued slowly upwards, too inexperienced, too stubborn or simply too greedy to back down. As she did, one or two of the pods that Kali could now see formed the hearts of the various sets of tendrils belched something foul-smelling into the air, and Dawn stared down at them, curling her mouth in distaste. She was now past the fifth turn of the Spiral, and halfway round the sixth, and as she concentrated on putting her foot on the next step she failed to notice that some of the tendrils were, with a sound of sucking mud, slithering slowly onto those beneath her.
Kali pulled against her captors, but even if she had been able to break free, knew now that there was nothing she could do. What had become increasingly obvious to her – that the plants weren’t dead but long dormant, untended since the demise of the Old Race and deprived of light as nature had reclaimed the dome – was, in truth, academic. What mattered was, reinvigorated, these things had a purpose, a purpose that answered the question of why the Old Race had needed more plants in the Sardenne. Because they weren’t plants at all – not just plants. They had been grown here as guardians. Guardians of the key.