by Mary Weber
Seleni turns to him and, like lightning, reaches up to grab her hat, only to discover it’s gone. She glances at me long enough to take in the fact that my hat is missing too, then straightens, lifts her chin in the air, and walks over to Beryll. She promptly pulls his hand from his nose and says matter-of-factly, “Rhen’s here to win obviously, and I’m here to help. Good thing, too, because look at your face, Beryll! Your nose! Here, let me—”
“Sel—Miss Lake! It’s fine! Please, I—”
His futile resistance is drowned out by a stomach-curdling yelp emanating from Sam. I clamber over to see what’s wrong with him, but I can already tell it’s his ankle. I bend down to touch it, noting the skin is turning way too blue too quick. He pulls it away but not before I see the sweat pouring off his face and the swelling setting in around his shoe.
I look up at him and Lute. “It’s broken.”
“Happened in the landing.” Sam groans. “By the way, good to see you, Rhen. You look like a boy.”
“Stop talking. We need to stabilize it.”
He grits his teeth. “No, we need to get movin’ before—”
Shouts erupt from the forest path just behind us as Vincent, Germaine, Rubin, and one of the four boys from the other boat charge out. They hardly give us more than a side eye as they hightail it for the spiral stone building thirty feet in front of us.
“Basilisks!” Rubin yells, and suddenly the ground is shaking and a terrible roar shreds the air.
Lute grabs Sam’s arm and swings it over his shoulder to yank him up. Sam screams, but Lute doesn’t stop—he just grips Sam tighter and starts to run with him as we head toward the others.
The stone building looks more like a mausoleum than a spiral from eye level—and as we spring for the single visible door, I note the wording etched above it is the same style as on the tent. But I must be tired, because my brain shuffles the letters out of order to read Dining for the Dead, which in the old language would’ve meant that either only the dead may enter or something is purposefully trapped inside this place.
I don’t have time to think more on it because a basilisk the size of a bloody whale bursts through the trees. His thick body snakes across the ground, writhing through the dirt faster than we can run as his beaked face lunges for us.
Lute throws Sam inside and shoves me through just before Rubin slams the door behind us, and the basilisk gives another screaming roar that echoes through the chamber, triggering a string of lanterns to turn on.
The door lock clicks into place from the outside.
“Of all the—”
“That thing came from nowhere!”
“Three of those boys disappeared just before it got them—did you see that?”
Shaking, I ignore Germaine and Rubin and check to ensure Beryll and Seleni made it through. Then peer at Lute, who’s eyeing the room we’ve just locked ourselves in.
Only it’s not a room. It’s a circular cavern carved into white stone, with crypts lined up along the walls.
Lute lifts his finger to his mouth and turns around slowly until he’s facing us. Germaine falls silent. I hear Rubin gulp.
This isn’t an underground sanctuary. It’s the catacombs of the ancient knights, and the writing above the door outside was a warning.
We have indeed walked into the dining room of the dead.
19
Our every movement echoes too loud. Too intrusive. Sam’s groans ricochet off the walls as sweat drenches his shirt. He tries to muffle them in his sleeve, but it only makes the sound of his pain more agonizing.
I turn to shove my shoulder beneath his other arm to help ease the weight on his ankle, and I’m about to help Lute walk him forward when I catch Vincent staring at us.
He takes in my hair, my face, and the dead man’s clothes I’m wearing. Any hint of embarrassment and shame on Vincent’s face for his behavior last night is quickly replaced by a curled lip and a flicker of suspicion directed at Lute before his eyes reconnect with mine. “Miss Tellur.”
I glance at Seleni and Beryll—the latter of whom’s chest is now covered in blood from his nose—and Vincent follows my gaze long enough to utter a sharp snort under his breath.
Sam gives another moan and Germaine hisses, “Would someone shut him up, please?”
Lute and I heft Sam higher before Lute points toward the only clear way out of the crypt-lined room. A narrow opening that leads to darkness. I shudder as Seleni whispers, “Beryll, I don’t want to do this.”
Whatever he says to calm her is between them, but Vincent looks at me again and purses his lips before he nods to Germaine and Rubin. “Let’s check the room.” Then he murmurs in my direction, “We’ll discuss this later.”
I raise a brow. Oh you bet we will.
The three of them move to inspect the circular space, but they won’t find anything. The crypts are old and sealed—as are the walls—and any etchings or grave goods that were here have long since been stolen by weather or ransackers.
We wait until their quick search is done, then follow Germaine, Rubin, and Vincent to the singular opening at the far side of the room. Whatever used to be covering it is now hanging in pieces of thick plaster from metal bars—as if something burst through it at one point and the architecture never recovered.
I shiver again and tighten my hold on Sam as Lute and I duck him through into the next room, which is not a room at all but a passage of steep stairs inside a stone tunnel. Sam’s pained breathing bounces off the ceiling and makes the already-stifling air feel thicker. Staler.
It smells of sulfur.
We hobble him step-by-step to the bottom, where we are pushed through another doorway and into another room with a new set of lanterns that flicker on.
Seleni’s gasp is as loud as Germaine’s curse.
Stone coffins line both sides of the low-ceilinged space. They’re pressed into the walls like boxed sentries in perfect measurements of five paces apart, above a floor that slopes sharply downward. And on their front-facing lids is carved the knight’s seal of Caldon.
“It’s like an army of dead,” Vincent mutters.
“At least the coffins are closed,” Beryll whispers.
“At least they’re actually dead,” Rubin says.
I keep my mouth shut and don’t say anything. Because I’m not so sure they are dead.
Lute eyes me as if he knows what I’m thinking, because he’s thinking it too—and nods toward the ground that is sloping away from us. I peer down, and after a moment I see what he’s indicating.
The passage is taking us farther underground.
I swallow and try to hoist Sam higher to keep his leg from hitting the ground so heavily, even as everything inside me screams that the very atmosphere in here is made of death. And there’s no way out but to keep heading down.
“Where’s the other kid?” Beryll hisses. “The one who was with you running from the forest?”
Germaine doesn’t turn around. Just keeps going as he says, “Oops. Must’ve locked him outside.”
Beryll looks to Seleni, and a flicker of fear crosses his broken, swollen face. Only his expression is not for himself. He’s afraid for her.
I don’t blame him. I’m scared for all of us.
“You all are talking too loud,” Vincent says.
“Hey, we’re not the ones carrying a moaning beached siren,” Rubin scoffs. “Besides, what’s there to fear? Ghouls only come out at night.” But he trims his tone and tries to walk softer.
Vincent ignores Rubin to hurry forward toward what appears to be a corner up ahead. “It looks like we follow this path.” Except when we reach it, it’s nothing more than a deep-set alcove with more coffins. Older coffins. Some of the lids have cracked and crumbled, and scraps of shroud and bones peek out.
He turns and scowls. “Dead end.” As if we couldn’t tell. Because there’s nothing. No other doors. No windows. No way out but to follow the long, sulfur-saturated tunnel in front of us that seems to meld from
one passage opening to the next.
The rank scent grows stronger the farther in we go. It pricks my nose and burns my eyes, and even I try not to stare at the endless walls of sarcophagi too long. There’s something eerie about them—even for someone who’s used to dealing with dead things.
When we reach the tenth opening, leading to the tenth long passageway, the sulfuric smell flares and the atmosphere thickens. The flickering lights are dimmer here, and whether that’s from the strange layer of grey haze or simply because there’s less air, they sputter slower and cast shadows to reveal older, yellower stone walls marked with a series of carvings missing from the previous passages. I wonder who’s buried here and for how long. And how many other contestants have shuffled past them through the years.
A splash of wet hits my nose and splatters on my cheek. I peer up into the shadows as, beside me, Sam shudders too. By my estimation we’re under the deepest part of the lake surrounding the island.
Sam suddenly stumbles, and when I glance over, his eyes have glazed and his head has dropped into a faint. I look at Lute. “He needs to rest,” I mouth.
Lute firms his chin because we both know that’s not going to happen in here. So we keep walking.
Twenty more minutes eke by as we tread more corridors exactly like the ones we’ve just left, and by the time we hit what is by my count the nineteenth coffin-lined passageway, the moisture is dripping down like misty rain, and the air’s so coiled with the smell of rotting eggs that Rubin and Beryll keep gagging. Until Seleni smartly tears two pieces of fabric from her pant legs and has them wrap it around their faces—Beryll’s rather delicately.
I push Lute and Sam ahead, then step through the nineteenth doorway, only to freeze in my tracks.
Beryll, Seleni, Vincent, and the others fumble into us, and I move aside enough to let them in, and then they are gasping and motionless too.
The room we’ve just stepped into is a shorter length than the others, with a doorway at the far end. It’s also taller—at least three stories high, with giant, graceful columns spanning floor to ceiling, where stone chandeliers hang from stone chains to suspend lifelessly over long tables that look eerily like cadaver slabs.
Whatever this used to be, it wasn’t originally built as a tomb. It was made for a king, and this space is some type of banquet room.
Or maybe it was built as both.
Rubin coughs into his makeshift scarf. “What the?”
Lute leans over to slap a hand over his mouth so fast, Rubin doesn’t even have time to react before Vincent also smacks the back of his head. “Shh, you dolt.” Vincent lifts a finger to his lips and tips his chin to the walls.
Rubin peers around, and his forehead pales as if it’s dawned on him where we are. The same way it’s dawning on me too, as my eyes adjust to the shadowed walls.
The crypts lining them are made from the same stone, with the same etchings, same distance apart as the last passage. Except these are open.
And rather than shreds of cloth and crumbling bone, these are filled with ghouls.
Draped in white death robes, their bones and flesh look almost human beneath their closed eyelids. As does their skins’ yellow glow, created by the sulfuric air tainting their permanently decaying bodies that never have rest, only slumber.
I look at Lute and point to their arms. The right one of each is thrust out, like an arrow, aimed toward the opening at the far end of the hall. And on the outstretched hand of the ghoul mounted closest to that doorway dangles a thin chain holding a key.
My throat drops into my gut. This isn’t just a dead king’s dining hall. This is a banqueting lair.
A sudden loud gagging rings out. Rubin is leaning over, losing his face scarf and what little water is left in his stomach. No matter how silent he’s trying to keep it, the sound still echoes through the room, and we all jerk toward him as if to mute the trauma. But then he’s finished and everyone’s slowing mid-movement, trying to let the sound die away as quick as possible without adding anything to it.
We stay paralyzed in place for what seems like an eternity. Standing there. Watching. Waiting.
To see if their eyes will open.
It’s an elongated minute before Vincent finally beckons us to move forward.
Lute and I tug Sam up as high as I’m able, to try to keep his feet from scraping the floor. We step slowly through the hall. Eyes wide on the ghoulish faces. Every tread rooted in the fear of their awakening.
Vincent, Germaine, and Rubin move faster than we can and have soon hurried ahead. We’ve only hit the halfway point by the time they make it to the opening—through which I can see two adjoining rooms. Lute picks up our pace as the three Uppers duck in, except the next instant Vincent reappears and looks our way.
I frown. What’s he?
He lunges to the side, sets his foot on a coffin ledge, and hefts his body high enough to yank the hanging key off the final ghoul. With a crash he falls backward onto the floor, then is up and racing for the door.
Beryll swears, and Seleni tries to shush him, but it doesn’t matter—the ghouls’ eyes flash open, one at a time, like a row of lanterns being lit.
Which is when the moans start up.
So deep, so empty, my bones shake from the wretched sounds.
In one swoop Lute grabs Sam and yanks him across his shoulders, then yells at Beryll to get Seleni and me through the doorway. Suddenly it’s not just the moans filling the room but the wisps of sulfuric mist. They’re coming on so thick, the haze almost obscures the opening.
We rush for the hole in the wall, and the next second we’ve all five plunged through and are racing into the next room. Only to be stopped by a metal wall Rubin is standing in front of, banging his fist on and yelling. “They went up without us. Hurry, help me! They went without us!”
“Where?” Beryll shouts, but Rubin just points at the metal and keeps yelling.
In unison Lute and I drop Sam, then rush to look—to see which lever makes the wall open and close. My hands search the crevices—every indent and space, but I can’t find one. Oh hulls, I can’t find one!
The room starts shaking from the ghouls’ moans.
“They’re coming!” Seleni yells.
I turn to glance through the doorway and see them dropping down one by one from their coffins, in some sort of unified reverie. Of all the—
I lunge for the side wall—the one that’s covered in the same strange, scripted carvings as the tombs—and feel it for any markers. There’s got to be a lever here.
“I thought Germaine said they only wake at night,” Rubin whines.
“Well, apparently they don’t,” I snarl. “Now move.”
The ceiling starts shaking just like the floor, dropping dust and pebbles, and the opening between us and the ghouls’ hall is making a grinding sound. I look over to find Lute kicking at a knob in the wall beside it. “I think it’s to seal the opening.” He groans.
Rubin stares at us. “It’s too late. We’re all going to die.”
“Oh for bloody sake, pull yourself together!” Beryll leaves the metal wall he and Seleni were trying to force up and jumps to help Lute, but the second he does, Rubin lunges for Seleni and pulls her toward the ghouls’ hall.
“Rubin!”
Lute and I both leap to grab him, but Beryll is already there landing a solid punch to Rubin’s jaw. He stumbles and releases Seleni long enough for Beryll to grab her, and then Sam jumps up and screams just before he throws himself full force into Rubin. He slams Rubin to the ground and they slide to where the ghouls have just converged. And for a second, the screeches of Rubin and the undead combine into one.
And then the lever Lute had been kicking at squeals, and the entire wall and ceiling rumble just as the stone around the opening begins to crumble and fall, and a slab suddenly drops into place.
“Sam! Sam!” I scream for him and scramble for the door. “Sam!”
Except it’s no good. He and Rubin are stuck outside with
the ghouls while we’re coughing and choking on a roomful of dust and the horror that is spiraling up my throat.
“Rhen, the door!”
Seleni jumps for the metal door opposite us that just lifted open. Whatever lever Lute hit must’ve been rigged to raise it while bringing down the other.
I grab Lute and start for it, when Beryll yells, “Wait, I’m stuck!”
I spin around.
Beryll’s leg is partially wedged in the crevice between the wall and the now-fallen door.
“Beryll!” Seleni scrambles over to tug him free. When the thing won’t move, she starts clawing at it with her nails. I rush to help her, but Beryll holds out a hand to stop us. His bare, bloody chest is turning pale and his face now free of Seleni’s scarf is twisted in pain, and when he speaks his tone is more angry than anything. “It’s not going to work. I’m not going anywhere until Holm gets me.”
I keep digging anyway, as Seleni says, “But you have to move—you have to keep going—we’re almost there!”
His cheeks hollow as he sucks in and winces. “It’s stuck solid, and—broken I think.”
She crouches on her haunches and stares him straight in the eye. “Beryll Jaymes, we are not leaving you down here. Now help us—”
He pulls her face in with both hands and plants a kiss firmly on her lips. “Miss Lake, I’m serious that I’m not going anywhere. So go, and I’ll see you soon.”
Behind me, the metal door lets out a squeal as if it’s going to fall. Lute reaches out to shove his hands up to hold it. “Rhen, this thing is moving.”
Seleni turns to glance at him, then looks over at me. She inhales. Then nods. “You two catch up with Vincent and Germaine. I’ll stay with Beryll.”
I ignore her and keep digging around Beryll’s leg, which, judging by the weight of the boulder on it, is most definitely broken. “Not a chance.”
The metal door starts shaking, dropping more dust on us. She grabs my hands and yanks them from the rocks. “Rhen, go. I’ve got this.”
I shake my head. “Beryll’s actually hurt, Seleni.”
“I know. But you can’t help us—only Holm can. So go find him.” She tugs my hands from the rubble and forces me to stand and look at her as the metal door makes a noise like it’s beginning to bow. “I came to support Beryll. And to show what we can do. But I’m not like you, Rhen. I want you to win—I want you to show them you can. But my way of winning is different, and it’s my own choice. I’ve always wanted the life of a wife, and mother, and helpmate to my husband, and I know you may not think much of that, but it’s what I want. And I’d be proud of it. Same as I’ll be proud of whatever you do.”