The City Under the Mountain

by D. W. Hawkins

  “I think you got him.” Allen moved to stand beside Shawna. “Glad somebody did, for once.”

  “See?” Shawna turned in his direction. “I don’t have to be a wizard to have some insight.”

  With that, she kneed Allen hard in the side of his leg, causing him to dance around in pain. Bethany laughed, and even D’Jenn paused in his work to snicker at the exchange. Dormael leaned against the building and smiled.

  “You know what that’s for, Allen Harlun!” Shawna crossed her arms and glared at him.

  Allen snickered as he rubbed his thigh. “I have a pretty good idea.”

  “I don’t,” Dormael said. “I want to know.”

  “Whatever little joke he’s sharing with your runt of a daughter.” Shawna turned her glare on Bethany. “You’ll get yours, too, little girl. Just you wait.”

  Bethany stuck out her tongue. “You’ll have to catch me first.”

  “Don’t let her get you, little pig! You know what happens if she does. You don’t want a bug in your—”

  Allen cut off as Shawna made to punch him, stepping away as he laughed.

  “I think you’re right, Shawna,” D’Jenn said, bringing everyone’s attention back to the door. “I think…if I just…”

  D’Jenn made a clawing gesture with his right hand—the one still resting against the door. To Dormael’s astonishment, his fingers sank into the stone of the doorway, the lighted symbols sinking with them like threads of burning crimson. With a slow twist of his wrist, D’Jenn turned the symbol like a key spinning a tumbler, and the complicated rune became a single, cohesive glyph.

  D’Jenn smiled. “Figured you out, you bastard.”

  “I believe it was I who figured it out.” Shawna winked at D’Jenn when he made a conciliatory gesture to her.

  “What now?” Allen said. “It’s still not doing anything.”

  D’Jenn glanced over his shoulder. “I haven’t let go of it yet. I’m giving you all the chance to get ready in case the spell starts cooking you from the inside instead of opening the door.”

  Allen grumbled something under his breath.

  “That’s not funny.” Shawna eyed the door with trepidation.

  “All the same,” D’Jenn said. “If you want to back away, now is the time.”

  With a smooth, cautious motion, D’Jenn pulled his hand from the stone. Allen cursed under his breath as D’Jenn took a step back, though no one made to run. Bethany came to stand by Dormael, receiving a tousled head from D’Jenn as she walked by. Dormael hugged her to his side and turned to face the door.

  The circular block of stone quivered in its setting and jumped as if something slammed into it from the other side. Everyone tensed on the verge of running for cover. There was a hiss of air as the doorway quivered once again, like the seal breaking on a watertight barrel. With the grating noise of stones grinding together, the circular door rolled to the side.

  The light in the runes flickered as the spell tried to work. Specks of sparkling energy leaked from the symbol in several places, and the discordant nature of the spell’s melody increased. Tendrils of crimson lightning crawled over the symbol. Dormael grabbed Bethany by the scruff of her shirt and pulled her backwards, placing himself between her and the door.

  With a final fizzle of energy, the glyphs went dead, and the door settled in its frame. It had moved just enough for one person to squeeze through at a time, leaving a crescent-shaped hole in the face of the building. Darkness threatened from within, and dust floated out from the hole as another gust of wind blew over the mountain top.

  “Well, at least it didn’t kill us,” Allen said. “I don’t feel cooked, anyway.”

  Bethany scowled at the opening. “I still don’t want to go in there.”

  “We have to be careful.” D’Jenn turned to give everyone a meaningful look. “There could more spells, and if we can judge by this one, they’ll be tough to figure out. Don’t touch anything, even if you’re sure it’s harmless.”

  Shawna fingered the hilt of one of her blades. “I hope we’re not cracking the seal on a nest of Garthorin. How do we know this place isn’t crawling with them?”

  “We don’t,” D’Jenn said, “but I doubt it. Whatever this place is, it was meant to be locked down. A Garthorin couldn’t activate that spell.”

  Shawna eyed the opening. “Sure, but who’s to say this is the only way in? There could be another door.”

  Allen sighed. “Well, if the rest of you are going to stand out here yapping, I’m going in. It’s getting chilly out here and I’m tired of waiting.”

  Drawing a hand-axe from his side, Allen slipped through the door. The opening was just wide enough for him to fit through when he turned sideways. Shawna drew one of her swords and followed him. Dormael moved after them, towing a reluctant Bethany behind him. She gave the darkness beyond the opening a fearful glance before hiding it behind a scowl.

  That’s more than just childish reluctance—she’s afraid.

  Dormael gave her a reassuring smile and squeezed her hand. She squeezed back, but his attempt at comfort did little to banish the dread on her face. Bethany walked with her teeth clenched together and an anxious gleam in her eyes.

  It must have been that thing in the temple. D’Jenn said she’s been having nightmares.

  Once inside the room, Dormael opened his Kai and summoned a magical light.

  The interior walls were covered in more carvings, though the designs struck Dormael as more decorative than functional. The room was dominated by a central pedestal. It rose from the stone and opened at the top, like a flower blooming in a field. There was a slot in the center of the stone pedestal, surrounded by tiny filaments of silvery metal. They had a tight, web-like arrangement, resembling veins.

  Inside the room, the hum suppressing Dormael’s Kai was gone. He could still hear it, but it was a distant noise rather than a present nuisance. By the look of relief on Bethany’s face when she slipped through the door, she felt its absence as well.

  “What is this place?” Shawna stared at the corner of the room, where the walls met the ceiling. The interior joint had an odd, sunken shape, as did the rest of them. More symbols were carved in the stone, creating an eye-bending pattern that made Dormael’s Kai shiver.

  “This room has a spell written into its walls,” Dormael said. “I can feel it.”

  Allen gave Dormael a wary look. “What sort of spell?”

  Dormael listened to the room with his magical senses. Buried in the stone, like a web made of light, was a multitude of metallic filaments. Dormael followed their twisting pattern with care, trying to divine the purpose behind its arrangement. The symbols carved in the face of the stone bore little resemblance to the underlying web.

  Dormael opened his eyes. “The stone is infused with a metallic web. It’s like…like the pattern in the veins of a leaf.”

  Allen grimaced. “I don’t know why, but that sounds gross to me.”

  Bethany snickered.

  Dormael pushed his senses deeper, listening to the tone the buried filaments returned to his Kai. He could feel them reverberating from deep inside the mountain, growing like a quicksilver mold from somewhere below. Magical sparks still traced sections of the pattern, but it was mostly silent. The web vibrated, a pulse of quiet energy humming at its center.

  “Part of it is still active,” Dormael said. “I think the spell might be functioning deeper in the mountain.”

  “How deep?” D’Jenn shouldered into the room. He moved to examine the pedestal, running his hands over the metal filaments in its center. “I wonder what was meant to go here. Some sort of key, maybe.”

  Shawna put her sword back in its sheath. “Whatever it was, it’s not here anymore. What do you think this was for?”

  “I couldn’t begin to speculate.” D’Jenn closed his eyes, and Dormael felt his Kai poking around the room.

  Shawna sighed. “You mean you want to brood in silence about it. Come on—if you had to guess, what w
ould you say?”

  D’Jenn took another look around. “The placement of this room makes me wonder. If the spell reaches far into the mountain, why build something like this at the top? This pedestal is meant to be a focus of some kind.”

  Allen took a step away from the table. “A focus for what?”

  “If I had to guess,” D’Jenn said, giving Shawna a look to demonstrate his reluctance, “I’d say it’s some kind of weapon.”

  Dormael nodded. “That makes sense.”

  “Why?” Shawna came over to look at the pedestal.

  “Because it’s built on high ground,” D’Jenn said. “It requires some kind of key to activate. Those pillars outside could have been used to focus magical energy. If I were going to design a devastating magical weapon, I might build something like this.”

  Dormael gave D’Jenn a meaningful look. “If this place is so old it’s never been mentioned in our histories, then these spells have been sitting here for thousands of years—thousands, and parts of them are still working. A weapon built to the same standard would be a terrible thing.”

  “What do you think it does?” Shawna said.

  D’Jenn shrugged. “Who can say? Maybe it can rain fire from leagues away. Maybe it’s just meant to be a focus, like the Crux at the Conclave. But why build it all the way out here?”

  “To protect it,” Allen said. “Make it hard for your enemies to destroy it, or take it from you.”

  D’Jenn nodded. “I could be wrong, too. Maybe it just records the position of the stars.”

  Shawna snorted. “This much effort for a calendar?”

  “We’ll never find out unless we go deeper,” Allen said. “Just tell me if you hear something that will burn my guts out.”

  D’Jenn moved to the rounded portal leading deeper into the mountain. “I’m going first. You might step on something that kills us all.”

  “Please, go right ahead.” Allen gestured to the portal. “If you step on it first, maybe I’ll have a chance to survive.”

  “Maybe.” D’Jenn peered into the tunnel beyond the doorway. “Let’s go.”

  Bethany sighed as everyone followed D’Jenn, her eyes darting to the corners of the room. She hugged her arms to her sides, stepping lighter than a ghost. Dormael stayed near to her, but Bethany ignored him in favor of the shadows.

  When was the last time I saw her truly frightened?

  The tunnel twisted downward at a smooth angle, spiraling like the coils of a giant serpent. The floor of the cave had been worked smooth, either by magic or painstaking labor, and the walls were circular. A thickened section of stone, like a great pipe, ran along the top of the corridor. It was carved with more symbols, and Dormael could sense a thick vein of metal embedded within.

  Was this whole place powered with magic?

  “It’s like the Rat Holes.” Bethany’s voice echoed through the dark. “There were spells laid in the stones there, too.”

  “The Rat Holes are a crude shadow of what this thing was,” D’Jenn said from further down the tunnel. “The spells under the Conclave are meant to gather and focus energy. They’re simple—they’re just built on a grand scale. Whatever this thing was meant to do, it’s well beyond the Conclave’s abilities.”

  Dormael ran his finger over the smooth wall of the cavern. “Didn’t Indalvian mention caches of knowledge hidden in the dark places of the world?”

  “He said his master was the caretaker of such a place.” D’Jenn nodded.

  Shawna gave them a considering glance. “Do you think this is it?”

  “Unlikely,” D’Jenn said. “I think this is something else. Older, maybe.”

  Everyone grew quiet as they moved deeper into the complex. The air was still and smelled of decay, though it wasn’t the visceral stink of decomposing bodies. This was the smell of age, the stink of a long forgotten fate. Dormael and D’Jenn kept magical lights humming above them, pushing the shadows ahead as the party went deeper. The only sounds were the scuffs of their boots over the stone and the rattle of Allen’s weapons.

  The darkened corridors felt different than the ruins of Orm. There was nothing oppressive about the darkness, nothing hungry about the shadows. Instead, Dormael felt a curious sadness. This place, whatever its purpose had been, was wondrous. To have such knowledge be forgotten, left discarded in this remote valley on the edge of the world, offended Dormael. Even these people, whomever they had been, for all their advancement and obvious power, had succumbed to the march of time.

  Did that predict something about all societies? There were people in Eldath living on the bones of their ancestors’ creations. Shera was such a place—a sprawling city built upon the ruins of a grand, ancient machine. Dormael had never been, but he’d heard stories of waterwheels larger than any building, of axles and gears stretched across a waterfall no sane man would try to cross. Despite the size of the falls and violence of the river, the ancient Sherans had built a bridge wide enough for an army, linking the cities of East and West Lodinburg.

  This underground complex had the same weight of accomplishment, the same defiant nature in its construction. Such a feat would have been recorded somewhere. The modern Sherans were proud of the deeds of their ancestors, even if the secrets behind those accomplishments had been lost to time. How could this mountain have stayed hidden over the years?

  “Why have we never heard of this place?” Dormael said. “Lots of people have been up here, including Hamarin the Wanderer.”

  D’Jenn shrugged. “Hamarin was a liar. He was wrong about the Garthorin and the river. I’m starting to wonder if he was misleading his readers on purpose. Maybe he wanted to lead any prospective adventurers into danger.”

  “How far do expeditions travel into the mountains?” Shawna gave them a skeptical look. “We’ve got three wizards in our group and we were nearly overrun. If what one seeks is glory and a chance to kill Garthorin, why push farther into their territory than needed?”

  “Fair point,” D’Jenn said. “But something about it gets under my skin.”

  Dormael looked at his cousin. “You think Hamarin lied in his book?”

  D’Jenn shrugged. “Only to way to find out is to keep going. This corridor has to end in a room. Let’s see what we find.”

  ***

  Nalia stared at the circle of flames, entranced by the spectacle.

  A pair of Mala’kii warriors—shirtless, tattooed men—were facing each other at arm’s length, weathering a dangerous storm of spinning steel. Each man had a pair of thin, curving swords he was spinning in ever faster, ever more complicated patterns. A drummer at the edge of the circle beat a heart-racing rhythm, stopping the beat at established intervals. Onlookers screamed with delight as the men stepped away. After a moment of rest, the contest ensued at a quicker tempo.

  “Is this a game?” Nalia said. “Men in my country do something similar when they’re drunk, stabbing at the spaces between their fingers with knives.”

  Allisondra chewed on a piece of roasted meat. “Not a game. The levinkala is a tradition going back generations. The point of the dance is to be skilled enough to leave your opponent without a scratch. If the gods take a tithe of your blood in the circle, they have deemed you worthy of their attention.”

  “The whole point is to come out with a wound?” Nalia held back a comment about men and their foolish games. “I see.”

  Allisondra smirked at her. “You do not, but it is to be expected. Mala’keenan live by the sword. It is their destiny, their purpose. Nothing makes them so happy as to be the prize warrior, the most worthy. They dream of a glorious death in battle, to fulfill their promise to the Mala’kii.”

  “Are they slaves?” Nalia watched the dance between the two warriors. “How do you keep them from revolting and taking power?”

  “How?” Allisondra looked at her with genuine confusion. “Why would they do such a thing? They are not slaves, Cold Woman. The men of our people are proud warriors with a long tradition of victory.”
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  “Yes,” Nalia said, trying to find a diplomatic way to voice her thoughts, “but are they not subservient? Do the men of your society not bow to the will of your women?”

  Allisondra laughed, but not in a mocking, unfriendly way. “You think the Mala’keenan are subservient to their wives? No, Princess. It is not the women who rule the Mala’kii, but the malahim.”

  “Malahim.” Nalia tested her pronunciation. “What does the word mean in the World Tongue? If it translates, that is.”

  Allisondra thought for a moment. “It is a title, like your captain or lieutenant. There is no word for it in the veledrim tongue.”

  “Are the malahim chosen somehow?”

  “You might say they are chosen.” Allisondra gave her a sideways look. “They are chosen the same way the victor of the levinkala is chosen.”

  Nalia looked to the circle of fire. “By the gods, you mean.”

  “Your people would call them sorcerers. That is why they are malahim instead of just mala’keli.”

  “But they’re all women,” Nalia said. “What do you do with the male children who manifest the talent for sorcery?”

  Allisondra shrugged. “None are born to us.”

  “None?” Nalia furrowed her brow. “How is such a thing possible? Everywhere else in the world—at least, from what I’ve read—there are both male and female sorcerers.”

  Nalia had seen one such when she was a child. He’d been a stable boy who had set his master’s inn aflame during an argument over pay. The lad had been no more than fifteen when her father’s executioner had removed his head. Nalia shuddered at the memory. It had been only her third execution, and the first time she’d seen it done to someone so young. She’d had dreams about it afterward, and her mother had spent a week explaining the reasons behind the law.

  How is it only female sorcerers are born to these people?

  “Our people were brought to this place from far away,” Allisondra said. “We were slaves. Hunted by your ancestors. Our blood is not the same as yours.”