“I asked her to give some to Warrane, since he’s a friend and he’s a member of the guards,” I said.
“So we can’t just get more?”
Cynthia shook her head. “I only have a few batches with me, and getting more is a pain in the arse. I have a guy who hunts gorillogoran, but he lives weeks away from here. A trader passed through Yondersun a week ago. Said he was heading in that direction. I gave him a message, but it will be months before I hear back.”
“We weren’t expecting a mind control epidemic in the meantime,” I said. “So we better focus on what we can do. Riston said the girl was talking in her sleep. Something about the 50 Knights coming back. I don’t need to tell you that even one knight is a pain in the arse. They’re so holier than thou. Oh, look at me, I wear shiny armor and pick flowers for princesses. Pathetic. Always opening doors for people, showing off how gallant they are. Stupid losers. Anyway, don’t get me started on those lance-wielding worms. Gulliver, have you ever seen reference to these 50 Knights in any books?”
“Sorry, Beno.”
That wasn’t good.
As a scribe, Gulliver was a repository of old fables and legends from every far-flung corner of Xynnar. He’d traveled everywhere, always taking time to learn people’s stories. If he hadn’t heard of something, it meant that it was mysterious indeed.
“Anyone else got a clue?” I asked.
Nobody answered.
I hadn’t really expected to, but sometimes you have to put it out there. I guess I was just hoping providence would smile on us.
And then, an explosion rumbled through the dungeon.
CHAPTER 11
The sound boomed through the tunnels and vibrated all around us. I would have been more concerned, except explosions tend to do that in dungeons. It was why few of my traps involved things going boom, or its meaner older brother, kaboom. Structural integrity is fairly important when you live under tons of rock.
Stones crumbled from the ceiling. Eric brushed his hair back, shaking debris from his luscious locks. Tomlin looked skittish. Shadow looked surprisingly nervous too. She edged nearer to him, then realized what she was doing, and moved away.
“It’s Riston,” I said. I used my core vision to check the north face of the lair. “They’re trying to break through the doors.”
Another explosion, this time from the west. From the door that led to the Wrotun clan’s old cavern.
“Trying both sides, the stubborn buggers,” said Eric.
“Can they get through?” asked Gulliver.
I thought about it.
I’d used steel doors. One after another. They would hold against most attacks, but nothing was impenetrable.
Using my core vision, I checked the doors, and that was when I got a shock.
“Beno?” said Gulliver. “Everything okay?”
I faced Cynthia. “Tell me something...did Reginal or Galatee or Riston ever ask you to make some explosives for them?”
Cynthia shrugged. “All the time, for their mining projects. They have a quarry to the south.”
“Did they ever ask you to make something that would melt through steel when it exploded?”
“Well, yes.”
“And you did it?”
“I am the town tinker, Beno. I serve at Reginal’s pleasure. I owe that goblin more than you can ever know. If it wasn’t for him, I’d still be in shackles.”
“Damn it!”
“What is it?” said Gulliver.
“Riston’s blowing through the steel. He’s got a bunch of town guard gits helping him.”
“This one is also a town guard git, remember!” said Warrane, pointing at his combat leathers.
“Sorry, Warrane, but we’re in trouble. They’ve gotten through two doors. I can keep using essence to create more, but they’ll just keep blowing through them. Then, it becomes a test of whether I have more essence than they have explosives. Cynthia?”
Cynthia shook her head. “You probably can’t match them. I’ve been supplying Reginal for months. He insisted. If Riston had manipulated Reginal into giving him access, then he’ll have enough explosives to bombard your defenses for weeks.”
Another boom. The ceiling shook. A chunk of rock smashed onto Wylie’s foot. He hopped around, grunting in pain.
“This is not one of my nicest days, let me tell you,” I said.
Gulliver shrugged. “So just make a few traps, Beno. You know, a set of big, steel jaws with giant teeth. Or a pool of acid that gets larger every time it melts someone’s flesh.”
“Or a chamber full of apple skins,” said Eric.
“I eat my apples how I like. Is that a crime? My family was so poor that getting an apple was a special occasion. My brothers and I would share it. Kendler would get the most because he was the eldest. Lucilian would get the core. I’d get the skin. Some of my happiest days were spent with Ken and Luc, eating apple skins. I guess the habit stuck.”
“Your parents should have gotten you something you could share. Like a bloody tangerine or something.”
While Eric and Gulliver argued the finer points of fruit and which parts you should and shouldn’t eat, I focused on the dungeon. Using my mind-split technique, I could concentrate on both dungeon entrances at once.
At the north entrance, they’d blown through three steel doors. They were letting the sleeping gas vent outside before attempting each door.
On the western entrance, they couldn’t let the gas vent since that entrance was adjoined to a giant cave. So, they’d done something else. Something much worse.
Riston had sent a group of Yondersun children in first.
He sent five of them ahead, while each town guard also had three children with them. Their parents would never have agreed to their offspring being used as fleshy shields, of course, but Riston didn’t have a problem with things like permission.
I saw what he was trying to do. Riston knew that dungeon cores could see all parts of their dungeon. He knew I’d see the children, and he guessed what I’d do.
And damn it, he was right.
Begrudgingly, I gave a mental command.
Sleeping gas traps dissembled.
“We have a problem,” I said. “Riston is sending town kids to go first. I can’t use any traps. Can’t take any kind of risk of hurting them.”
“Riston,” said Gulliver, balling his fists. “So manipulative. So evil. So…”
“Clever,” said Eric. “I wished I’d thought of using children as a shield. Not only would their puppy fat absorb damage if it came to it, but most people are too squeamish to hit a child. The best fight is one you never need to have.”
This left me completely defenseless. Riston was blowing through the steel doors. It was taking time, but he was doing it. This meant there was no physical barrier I could make that would hold him back forever. Nor did I have any magic ones I could use.
And though I didn’t want to murder townsfolk, I had at least thought I could employ some of my less lethal traps. But now that Riston was sending children through first, that was out. A dose of sleeping gas could easily kill a kid. Sure, I was sort of an evil being and my dungeon was full of monsters, but we hadn’t sunk that low.
“We can’t hold them back,” I said. “Eventually, they’ll get through.”
“Then we need to leave,” said Gulliver.
“Run from my own dungeon? Abandon my lair and let that bastard take it?”
Eric rested a meaty hand on me. The glow from the mana light caught his luscious locks and reminded me just how fabulous they were.
“Beno,” he said. “This reminds me of a time when I was in the Everdrenched Forest. It was cold. So rainy my arse was more wrinkled than a seal’s ballsack. After hours of searching, I found myself the coziest hollowed-out tree. Really snug. I was just beginning to fall asleep when a bunch of hungry wolves surrounded me. Had to run for my life, and give up my lovely little snug. Point is, sometimes you have to make a sacrifice to keep fighting another d
ay.”
“You’re comparing leaving a hollowed-out tree to me having to leave my own dungeon? A place I have spent almost a year painstakingly constructing?”
Wylie gave a pronounced cough.
“Fine,” I said. “A place my miners have spent a year excavating, under my genius direction. One of the few places a core like me could call home. We can’t just live in houses in town, you know. I mean, I suppose we could. But it would be horrible. Houses have way too many cushions and blankets. And don’t get me started on doilies. What’s the point in them? Eh? They’re stupid and utterly useless!”
“Calm down with the doily hate, Beno,” said Gull.
“Sorry, I’m just stressed.”
Eric tossed his hair back. “Seems you have two choices then, Beno. Stay and fight the townsfolk and slaughter a few kiddies while you’re at it, or leave.”
“Call it a tactical retreat,” said Gulliver.
“Running away, tactical retreat. Same thing,” said Eric.
“Not so. Your choice of words can mean a lot. Some might call you a vagabond. Whereas you prefer the term barbarian. The connotations are different.”
“A sword has more power than a verb.”
“I could take you in a duel any day of the week, and I wouldn’t have to lift a sword.”
Eric scoffed. “That’s a good one! Let’s put it to the test.”
Before Eric could pounce on Gulliver, I floated between them. Eric banged his forehead into one of my sharper edges.
Eric shook his hand wildly as if that would get rid of the pain. “Ow! Beno, that hurt!”
“What’s got into you two?” I said. “You’re friends. Stop arguing.”
Eric folded his arms. “What’s it to be? A cowardly retreat…or do we stay and fight?”
“Yeah, Beno. A clever tactical withdrawal, or a senseless charge to death?” said Gulliver.
Gulliver and Eric both looked at me expectantly.
It made me sick to my core to think about leaving this place. To flee my own dungeon and let Riston prance around like a peacock. It made me feel so dirty that even killing a hundred heroes wouldn’t make me feel better.
But what was I supposed to do? Risk killing Yondersun children?
Some cores in the Dungeon Core Academy wouldn’t flinch at the choice. They’d kill Riston and keep their territory. But those cores didn’t have empathy. Empathy, that disgusting thing that was creeping up on me more and more the longer I spent time with humans. The more involved I got in Yondersun affairs, the more of it I developed. It was like an infectious disease.
Some cores, fresh out of the academy, would cheerfully classify the children as heroes, kill them, and then get on with their day. Why couldn’t I be more like them again? Why couldn’t I just kill indiscriminately, like I used to?
Those were the good old days!
So now, if we chose to fight, not only would we have to kill Yondersun town guards, but the guards would use children as meat shields.
If we gave ourselves up, Riston would order every single one of my dungeon monsters to be placed in cells. And what about after that? I doubted he planned on rehabilitating them for a life in society. The best they could hope for is he’d want to control their minds. The worst…well…I knew about some of the monster work camps and the fight pits that existed in grim places in Xynnar.
So fighting and giving up were as bad as each other. Like being asked to choose between uncurable scabies and fire poker enema.
My last option was to run. Abandon my own home and let that bastard waltz through it. The thought didn’t just stab at my pride; it made me so sick I wanted to split into a hundred sharp pieces of core and lacerate Riston until he was holier than a priest who’d just been stabbed full of holes.
Another explosion.
A crack appeared in the ceiling above us. The tunnels seemed to groan.
“Beno?” said Shadow. “What do we do?”
Gulliver and Eric waited for an answer.
Everyone stared at me. Warrane, Maginhart, Cynthia, Wylie, Brecht. All of them were my friends, all of them were under my protection.
“We have to go,” I said. “There’s no other way.”
Another boom marked Riston getting through all my steel doors. Somehow he was doing it without making the tunnels cave in completely. That made me think magic was involved as well as explosives.
I’d replaced the doors as he blew through them, but he had more explosives than I had essence. The stalemate was over. I didn’t have enough essence to hold him back.
It was then, as I saw the last steel door shatter, that a message submerged from my inner core.
Fight [Warrior Beetle Level 16] has died!
What?
Two cries rose out. Louder than the explosions. Mournful, full of pain.
“Death!” shouted one beetle.
“Kill!” shouted the other.
Switching to my core vision, I saw a pond-green gas seeping from both dungeon entrances and spreading through my lair.
With the doors blown, Riston had released some kind of toxin.
It had already claimed Fight, and now his best friend Death and Kill were fleeing from it.
I felt sick.
Fight, Death, and Kill had always come as a package. A trio. And now they were running for their little lives from toxic gas, while Fight lay on his back, legs curled in the air, eyes shut.
“Cynthia?” I said. “What the hell is that?”
She took her goggles off. Her eyes suddenly looked red and tired.
“A gas Reginal asked me to make. They found obscillian deposits in a cave twenty miles south of town. The caves were infested with hostile vermin, who were attacking the miners. Reginal wanted a gas he could use to get rid of them.”
“And now Riston is pumping it through my lair. I have never, ever wanted to flay the skin off a man’s bones more than him. If it was only me here…”
“Well it isn’t,” said Gulliver, kindly. “And you’re doing the right thing. We need to leave.”
“Everyone out. We have no choice but to leave the dungeon,” I said.
“Where?” said Wylie. “Both ways out blocked. Lots of guards.”
“There are other ways. Come on.”
Just then, the sound of scuttling grew louder.
“Death!”
“Kill!”
My beetles both shouted at once, their tone full of sorrow. They were looking in my direction as if their cries of “Death” and “Kill” were for me only. They were telling me what had happened to our dear friend. I hated it. It just sounded plain strange to hear Death and Kill without Fight preceding it.
As my monsters, my friends, and I left the loot chamber and escaped through an emergency tunnel, I cast my core vision. I saw guards prowling through the dungeon way behind us. I watched them dismantling traps. Smashing puzzles. In the first chamber, a guard was using a crowbar to pry up the pieces of the tile puzzle.
I watched them lay waste to everything I had built, and I felt such a tremendous surge of anger that my vision went blank for a second. I was lost in a void of my own thoughts. Fury surging through me, white-hot. I had never, ever felt such a feeling since my resurrection.
Before I knew it, they had reached my essence vine chamber. I watched as they raised torches to my essence vines and set them alight. The flames leaped from plant to plant, leaf to leaf, becoming a spread of burning orange and yellow that devoured every wall.
Gone. My only means of regenerating my essence, gone.
I was no use as a core anymore. Without a way to regenerate essence, I was exactly what people said.
A lump of floating rock.
Tomlin, who sent most of his life tending the essence vines, seemed to sense what had happened.
I didn’t know how. He had no core vision. He couldn’t see through walls. We were way south of the essence vine room, in an emergency tunnel. He shouldn’t have known.
“No!” he shouted.
Shadow caught up to him and yanked him back. They both fell onto the ground.
“Breathe,” she told him. “Think. If you go back, you’ll die.”
“But my vines…”
“I know.”
Tomlin stood up.
He punched the wall. Once. Twice. Three times.
His knuckles split and blood welted from them.
Shadow went to stop him, but Tomlin fixed her a look of boiling fury, and she shrank back.
Tomlin, the renowned coward of the dungeon, terrified some of us right then. Wylie could hardly take his eyes off him.
Only I really understood how he felt. The vines meant as much to Tomlin as they did to me. Without the essence vines, I couldn’t regenerate my essence. I couldn’t create traps, summon monsters. And without the vines, Tomlin had no purpose. No calling.
“We won’t let this go unanswered,” I said.
“When will we answer?” said Tomlin.
“Soon.”
CHAPTER 12
We followed the tunnels for hours. We walked through passageways wide enough to march an elephant through. Ones so cramped Eric had to expel all the air in his lungs so he could fit. Tunnels that had formed naturally rather than being mined, which Wylie critique as we walked. He pointed out how much more structurally-sound his tunnels were than nature’s.
“I think someone misses their old mining days,” I said. I was trying to sound as light-hearted as I could, to keep morale up. “If you like, Wylie, I can always make someone else dungeon enforcer. You can go back to mining.”
“No way, Dark Lord!”
Only four hours later did we see a shaft of light at the far end of one passageway. There was an incline that started gentle, then got steeper. I knew that if we followed the slope for another twenty minutes, we’d emerge into the wasteland, far away from Yondersun.
Shadow’s four hounds, more like wolves these days, gave excited yips.
“We’re not going out for a walk,” said Shadow.
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