Doors of the Dark

by Gregory Mattix

  “Stolak and his horde long ago forsook the Tenets of Preservation in their lust for power, bringing ruin first to their own lands far to the east. Once nothing remained for them there, they migrated, seeking out more life to steal and quench. Those that resisted were turned to empty husks, their vitality stolen to fuel Stolak’s madness—madness that seemingly has no end. Small settlements across the land have emptied out, abandoned as their refugees seek shelter amongst our people in the hopes of finding safety behind our walls.

  “Our guardians ride out to meet these corruptors in battle on the morrow, but how can we withstand this madman and his forces? Our Tenets are what keep us from destroying the earth beneath our feet. The Tenets keep us alive. Yet I fear they also are an anchor around our neck, rendering us too weak to fight such evil. It is with heavy heart that I have come to realize the inevitable—Stolak will destroy our fair Valirial and turn all life to dust beneath their feet. They will strip the vitality from our bones with lust rivaling that of any fiend. I fear that I, Alistor of House Denore, and my beloved children are the last of my line. Tomorrow, I shall join our guardians and perform my final duty to Valirial in the hopes that my own children, along with all the other families, against all odds might yet live…”

  The scrap of parchment, likely what remained of a journal, ended with those dire words. Malek searched around what had been Alistor’s library, judging from the dusty tomes lining the shelves of the room, but could find nothing else of the journal. The tomes remaining on the shelves crumbled to dust when he tried to open them. The scrap of journal had been stuck beneath a small bronze bust of a beautiful young woman mounted in a sconce on the wall. Malek removed the other busts, of a young girl and boy—Alistor’s children, he guessed—but found nothing.

  “Damn. Finally found a clue, but it’s merely a tease to get my interest piqued and nothing more.”

  Malek slumped down to the floor, leaning heavily against the wall. He closed his eyes a moment. The weariness that plagued him threatened to pull him under into sleep, but he resisted. From what he’d gathered, Alistor had been a leading figure of authority, if not the ruler of Valirial. Alistor and his cohort apparently met their doom after riding out to meet Stolak. They found no escape from this wasting death, nor will I.

  He rubbed his temples and extended his second sight out of habit, not expecting to find anything. He cast his gaze over blocks and blocks of ruins, with no sign of life. He noted with interest a great tower which still stood, soaring high overhead a vast plaza, likely the center of the city, as far as he could judge. The tower was several blocks from his current location.

  Perhaps I’ll go there next if weariness doesn’t overcome me.

  Slowly drawing his senses back in, he thought he saw a glimmer of something at the edge of his perception. Surprised, he focused on examining the library but could find nothing at first. Frowning, he decided it was like a mirage—his mind desperately wanted to find something, so he imagined it.

  Malek focused more intensely, just to be sure he was missing nothing. Then he saw the magical trace again, just at the edge of his senses. He could only see it when he wasn’t looking directly at it. A faint glimmer emanated from one of the bookshelves. The magical residue was very weak after ages of decay, but it was there.

  Excited, he got back to his feet and rushed over to the shelf. He gently pulled a few more tomes away, but they crumbled to dust as the others had. The thought of all that priceless knowledge being destroyed had made him depressed earlier. But now he barely noticed the destruction, intrigued about what he might find, and focused on the rear of the shelf.

  A glyph pulsing a faint amber was carved into the stone of the wall, in the whimsical image of a robust tree spreading its leaves in a broad canopy, the roots nearly mirroring the pattern below the ground. The magic infusing the glyph was weak, nearly exhausted, but it was there.

  Malek pressed his hand against it and closed his eyes, focusing his second sight. The amber glow pulsed faintly, like a heartbeat. He thought at first to draw the power from the glyph, hoping it would release its secret, but it resisted, and he sensed that if he did so, it would deactivate, forever hiding its treasure. Instead, he reversed the flow, allowing a trickle of his own remaining magic to flow into the glyph. It glowed brighter, and the pulsing sped up. He channeled more of his precious power into the glyph until it shone brightly. The pulsing stopped, and a clear chime sounded.

  A deep rumbling came from within the wall. Malek stood back as that section of bookshelf swung open a few inches. He peered through the gap, into the darkness inside. Slipping his fingers around the edge, he pulled on the bookshelf. With a grinding screech as it scraped across the gritty floor, the shelf swung open.

  Malek was disappointed. Instead of the roomful of secrets he hoped to find, only a narrow alcove was revealed, into which he could barely fit. The glyph glowed on the inside of the nook as well, filling it with its warm light. Revealed inside was a long staff leaning against the wall. A rolled-up scroll lay beside it on a narrow shelf.

  The staff was fashioned out of a pale wood, with a steel tip at the base and the head an ornamented carving of a tree resembling the glyph in the wall. The trunk of the tree was a large, brilliant emerald. He grasped the staff reverently but, after studying it a moment, was disappointed at feeling no magic within it.

  Next, he gently unrolled the scroll. It was well preserved, not yet having turned brittle, as the pages of the tomes had. The bold penmanship of Alistor filled the page.

  My dearest son or daughter,

  If you are finding this, then the guardians and I have failed in our last effort to stop Stolak. I hope our sacrifice was not in vain, but know that I never stopped caring for the two of you. Had there been another way, an outcome where we all survived, I would have yearned to make it so, but understand that my duty was first and foremost to our people of Valirial. With the loss of your mother in childbirth, I didn’t have many options to see to your safety while performing my duty here as a leader.

  When the Dark Lady arrived with the offer to take you two away to safety and keep you free from harm, I leapt at the chance. I doubt not that she has her own plans for you, of course, which I trust you are well equipped to deal with, but she gave me her word to see you safe, and I believe her. When a god makes you an offer, how can you refuse?

  The important fact now is you have made it here, to what is by now a cursed place of ruin and decay. This Staff of Preservation is my greatest achievement—take it and use it to heal the land. But take care that Stolak, if he still lives, does not get his evil hands on it, for I would not see my creation be turned to vile ends. If the staff were to fall into his possession, he could use it to forever enhance his powers and feed his madness. I am truly sorry that events did not turn out better and I could not be there to watch you grow up to be the man or woman that you are today, one that would undoubtedly make me proud.

  Live well and cleanse the taint from our land.

  Your loving father,

  Alistor Denore

  Malek’s mind was racing. He reread the scroll twice more to make sure he comprehended it. He couldn’t help but be impressed by the sacrifice of the noble Alistor, who had foreseen his demise yet created the staff that it might heal the land of the curse upon it. Even in death, although bittersweet, he had a plan to achieve victory.

  A shiver ran down his spine as he again looked over the section about Alistor’s children being taken away. Could it be? Could Alistor be my real father? His parents had told him he was adopted as a baby, yet they refused to impart whatever other knowledge of his origins they knew until he was of age. Tragically, they had died in the bandit attack, and his story would forever remain a mystery. Do I have a sister out there in the multiverse somewhere?

  He immediately dismissed his thoughts as foolishness. Valirial had been destroyed hundreds of years before, perhaps thousands. No way could he be Alistor’s son. A descendant, perhaps? That was a more realisti
c theory, one which could possibly explain his otherwise inexplicable powers.

  And who is the Dark Lady? Sabyl, the goddess of luck and thieves, perhaps? I can’t imagine Alistor ever making a deal with Veharis, an evil goddess of torment. None of the goddesses of good aspects he could think of would use the guise of the Dark Lady—perhaps some minor deity he didn’t know of, or perhaps Alistor was deceived in his desperation to see his children to safety. Malek sighed. The revelations created more questions than they provided answers to.

  He wondered what had happened to Stolak after he had destroyed the world, condemning it to become the Gray Lands. Is Stolak this dark presence I sense here? Surely, nothing could subsist in a dead world without magic, food, or water. The only way to know more would be to encounter the dark power, but he was in no hurry to do so.

  For the time, Malek felt some obligation as a possible descendant of Alistor to try to honor his memory and do what he could to heal the land.

  If I can bring life back, perhaps this isn’t a death sentence for me after all.

  He gently tucked the scroll into his satchel and took the staff in hand. It had a nice heft to it and felt sturdy enough, but not so heavy as to be a burden. He tried pushing some power into the staff and swinging it around, as if that would cause it to activate, but it remained inert. It was simply a nicely fashioned staff with no inherent magic, at least that he could discern.

  So I have a staff I can’t use and more questions than answers. More than I accomplished yesterday, so that’s progress, I suppose.

  Malek decided that no more answers would be found in Alistor’s crumbling library. He would continue onward until he was again overcome with weariness. He didn’t know how much strength he had left, as the Gray Lands continued to sap the life from him. There was much to do and little time, he feared.

  As he headed back through the expansive manor, he thought of the tower he had glimpsed earlier, rising up in the center of the city. Perhaps that will provide me a vantage point where I can determine my next destination. Between the eternal twilight of Nexus and the bone-chilling fog of the Gray Lands, he had a powerful desire to see the sun again.

  Malek entered the courtyard outside the great entry hall. He started as some movement caught his eye, but it was only a trick of the light. Or is it?

  He focused on the dim edge of the courtyard and again saw movement. The fog swirled, and a skeleton strode forth. This one was whole and moved in a long, lumbering stride. A rusty breastplate hung over the skeleton’s chest, and it clanked softly against its ribs as it moved toward him.

  Malek held the staff before him, swiftly searching the rest of the courtyard, but it was empty save the lone skeleton approaching him. He edged toward the ruined gate leading to the street, but the skeleton moved sideways, putting itself between him and escape.

  The skeleton stopped for a brief instant, as if taking his measure. It had a full mouth of teeth, which seemed to grin at him as it regarded him with its empty eye sockets. After a moment, it lurched into motion, moving swiftly toward him.

  Malek shivered, imagining the dark power animating it taking the time to study him.

  In three strides, it was on him. Its bony hands reached for Malek’s throat. He drove the butt of the staff square into its chest, striking the rusty breastplate and thrusting the skeleton back a step. Immediately, it came at him again, eerie in its silence, the only sound its feet scrabbling on the ground and the rattle of its loose breastplate.

  Malek unleashed a harder strike, this time to the head. The skeleton paused as its head rocked back in a sickening arc, but as if on strings, it swung back forward, grinning all the while, and its hands grasped for his neck. The hard bones tightened around his throat. He brought the staff up between them, trying to break the grip, but the skeleton was relentless. The hard, bony fingers dug into his flesh, squeezing his windpipe shut. He stumbled on a chunk of rubble and fell. The skeleton came down atop him, hands clasped around his neck like a vise.

  Panic surged through him, and he unleashed a blast of force. The skeleton was thrown off him to slam against the wall of the courtyard, where it shattered. The breastplate clattered to the ground, loud as an alarm bell in the stillness.

  The skeleton’s hands were still around his neck. Malek pried them free and tossed them away in disgust. The arms had ripped free of the shoulders at his blast. Mercifully, the skeleton remained still.

  He picked himself up and jogged through the ruined gate and onto the wide boulevard, fear hastening his stride. He again pictured the skeleton pausing, perhaps to allow the dark presence to take his measure. If it hadn’t been aware of him before, his use of magic had likely changed that.

  The fog shifted in the direction the skeleton had come from, and more figures moved in the gloom.

  Malek turned and fled.

  Chapter 10

  Arron dreamt of flying. He was soaring high above the twilit ground, the cool evening air rushing through his leathery wings. On the horizon, the sun’s pink-and-orange rays were fading away into the gray of twilight. He dove toward the ground, tucking his wings tightly to his sides. The air blasted him as he plummeted through the air as swift as any bird of prey although his body was a score of paces long from snout to tip of tail. When the ground came up alarmingly fast, he pulled out of the dive, wings snapping as he halted his fall. He arched his head back and roared in pleasure at the simple freedom of flight. He beat his wings and regained altitude once more.

  Something glimmered in the darkness below, catching his keen eye. Arron glided down to investigate. Trees swayed from the rush of air at his descent, grass bending flat. His taloned feet sank into the soft ground as he settled down. Ahead was the glimmering light, a face surrounded by glyphs carved on a megalith of stone. The face glowed with a bluish-white aura.

  “Approach, my servant.” A voice spoke in his mind, quiet yet powerful.

  Arron hunkered down and moved his head closer on his long neck. A woman’s face was carved in the stone, coldly beautiful. The eyes were onyx pits, yet somehow he could tell they focused on him.

  The stone mouth moved as it spoke again. “You have lost your way, and failure now threatens to doom my plans. I see now I must restore a seed of knowledge to your mind, that you might be of further use and continue your loyal service.” The stone face and glyphs blazed with a bright, icy-blue fire like the light of a distant cold burning star. Arron reared back in surprise, eyes squinting against the brilliance. A blast of chill air rushed around him before his skull was filled with piercing shards of illumination. The fragments resolved into images of places and people he didn’t know. One scene caught his eye, and he focused on it.

  A young woman, slim of build, with lavender hair and bone-white horns growing from her head picked her way through a dark cavern, dagger in hand. Arron could sense a malevolent presence permeating the woman’s surroundings, lurking just out of the range of her senses. Her face was filled with fear and trepidation, yet she remained determined. The blade of a traitor lurked at her back, ready to strike her down.

  Nera—she’s in danger! The realization shook him. She was his charge—he was supposed to be protecting her but had failed. He had been nearly slain and then imprisoned. The urge to defend Nera from harm was almost more than he could bear. Where is she? I must find her.

  He opened his mouth to warn her but couldn’t. A strangling force of darkness wrapped around him, crushing him to the ground until mud and earth filled his mouth and nostrils. He couldn’t breathe. A moment of panic seized him.

  The calming voice returned. “Neratiri has a role to play in the salvation of Nexus and all the planes. Time wanes, and the window of opportunity is closing swiftly. Awaken now with this seed of knowledge and return to your duty.”

  Arron’s eyes popped open, and he sat up with a gasp. He could breathe again, and most importantly, his thoughts were clear for the first time in a long time. The dream lingered in his mind, and the sense of urgency imparted was r
eal.

  What has it been now… days, weeks that I’ve been left to rot here? He could remember nothing since Lassiter had violated his mind, spinning him into madness.

  However, his thoughts were collected and his own once more. He remained in the empty darkness of the dungeon. The manacles rattled and chafed his raw wrists as he scratched at the growth of beard on his face. Only crumbs remained from the stale bread offered with a cup of foul-tasting water. The rats had eaten it, he was sure. He couldn’t remember having eaten in some time, his stomach a dull ache of emptiness.

  All was silent save the squeaking of rats and faint scratching of their claws on the stone floor. After a moment, those sounds disappeared as well. The rodents had evidently fled at his sudden stirring. A faint glow leaked around the edges of the cell door from a torch somewhere down the corridor.

  Something else had changed other than his newfound clarity of mind. Arron had a seed of knowledge he hadn’t had earlier. He knew his true purpose, as he did his identity.

  Nera was gone. She was lost somewhere, alone and afraid. Most importantly, she needed him—she was in grave danger. He fought down the shame at having failed both Nera and his mistress and instead focused on his current situation.

  With his newfound knowledge, he knew he must use his abilities to effect an escape and set things right.

  ***