by G. R. Cooper
“Interesting,” said Rydra, “and you hadn’t yet bound at one at all? Since entering the world, right?”
Wulfgar nodded.
“Interesting,” repeated Rydra, “I wonder what that’ll mean, if you bite the dust here.” He thought for a moment, “As it is, any of us,” he swept his hand indicating the rest of the group, “who die here will res back in Edonis, so we’ll be out of the fight. You?” he just shook his head, “Hell if I know, man, maybe you’ll res back where you first entered the game.”
Wulfgar smiled, “That would suck! I was way up in the mountains above Edonis, and I had to climb down,” he remembered, “and I had to eat some herb, uhm, Billy Goat’s Rope, to be able to climb down. I doubt that it’s even bloomed again.” He pictured himself trying, and failing, to descend to the valley floor, falling and splattering on the rocks over and over as he was born yet again at the top of the mountain chain. “That would suck!” he repeated.
The group stood, circling around the low entrance to a small cave. Inside was nothing but darkness, much darker than the star spattered night above them. The entrance was on the side of a low barrow, a grassy mound near the center of the small island. The grass seemed trimmed, probably by some livestock, but none was evident. The opening itself was neat, the dirt floor in front of it it tidy and cleaned of any debris, the arch shaped doorway seemed carved out of the hillock, but as homey as the little place looked, it emanated a sense of dread.
Wulfgar tried to lighten the mood, “This world needs a soundtrack. Some Carmina Burana or Conan the Barbarian.”
The rest of the group seemed to ignore the comment, as though waiting for one of them to decide to enter the mound.
Wulfgar shrugged, “Shall we?”
“Might as well,” said Lauren. She pulled her sword out of its sheath on her back and held the blade in front of her, arms bent and ready to attack. She looked back over her shoulder, “Light up some lanterns,” then turned to Snorri. “Let’s go.”
The viking ground his teeth in determination, hefted his axe and nodded. The pair walked through, into darkness.
“Hey!” said Wulfgar, holding up his lantern, “We haven’t lit these yet!”
Bael turned to him and, holding up one hand toward the lantern, spoke softly. Light flared into the lamp and Wulfgar closed the little window before drawing his own blade as the rest of the group stepped through the portal.
Wulfgar looked around the little room. It seemed, to him, surprisingly homey for the home of not only a faerie, but an undead faerie, and harbinger of death at that.
“Looks like Bilbo’s grandmother’s house,” said Rydra, as though reading Wulfgar’s thoughts.
The room wasn’t large, maybe five meters on each side, and the group was crowded together near the doorway that they’d come through, still spread in their combat formation. At the center of the room, a small table was set with two place settings, a chair on either side.
“I wonder how often the Baen Si entertains,” quipped Wulfgar as he scanned the rest of the room. A small fireplace, a fire gently crackling, took up the far wall and was flanked on either side by doors, both closed. The room was sparsely, but nicely, decorated. There seemed to be nothing to search, however; no containers. No boxes, no cabinets. Nothing to keep them there.
“Which door?” asked Lauren without taking her eyes off of that side of the room.
“I always used the ‘follow the right hand side of the map’ technique in my dungeon crawls,” said Snorri. The rest of the group nodded.
“Scouts up?” asked Rydra, then he looked over to Wulfgar and smiled, “Who’s first?”
“Coin toss?”
“Sure thing,” Rydra laughed. “Heads I win, tails you lose!”
Wulfgar smiled and set the lantern on the table as he moved through the group toward the right hand door. He was reaching for the handle when he felt a hand on his shoulder.
“Just a sec,” Rydra moved in beside him and dropped to one knee, inspecting around the edges of the doorway.
“No traps,” he said, “at least, none that I can detect.” He looked up at Wulfgar, “Remember,” he said softly, “you have about a minute of Stealth. Thirty seconds out, then thirty seconds back.” He stood, nodded toward Wulfgar then moved back into the protection of the tanks.
Wulfgar placed his hands softly against the door and leaned in, putting his left ear up to the wood. He held his breath, listening for anything he could hear from beyond the door. There was silence, so he reached for the wrought iron latch and slowly lifted it until the door began to push forward. Once clear, he lowered the latch again, then increased the pressure on the doorway.
He pushed, slowly, until the door had cracked just enough for him to slide through, then he activated Stealth and sidled into the next room. He waited a moment to let his eyes adjust, as the flickering firelight and glow from the lantern shone through the cracked door into the new space. The room looked long, much longer than it was wide. The width was no more than the previous room, but it stretched on into deepening darkness.
“Can you see anything?” a hissed, quiet question shocked Wulfgar into motionless. He looked down and to his left, at Prince’s snout that pushed just into the darkness.
“No,” whispered Wulfgar. Prince looked up, toward the sound of Wulfgar’s voice.
“I can see in the dark,” it said, “I’ll join you. I’ll follow behind.”
Wulfgar nodded and began to walk the middle of the room, into the darkness. He moved around the right hand side of a long table with high-backed, plush chairs lined down either side. There was nothing on the table itself except a white cloth. Paintings ranged down the right wall, but it was too dark to make out what they conveyed. Given the increasing feeling of oppression that weighted him down, Wulfgar wasn’t disappointed that he couldn’t discern what possible nightmare they portrayed.
He reached the far end of the room - it hadn’t been as long as it had first felt when he was staring into nothingness. There were two more doors in the hall, one on the far end, one on the left. Assuming the other way out of the front room was as long - or even half as long - as this room, the door on the left was another way into that chamber. He began to return, to trace his steps back to his party when Prince spoke.
“There you are,” the rat said from his hiding place along the wall. He had moved from the doorway, along the interior wall, and had found a dark spot between two cupboards just before the door at the halfway point of that wall.
“Shit,” muttered Wulfgar, angry with himself for forgetting the Stealth timer. “If I forget that at the wrong time,” he thought, “that’ll be a quick, one-way ticket back to … wherever.”
He hurried back through the to the first chamber, pulling the door completely open and flooding the new room with the soft light of the first.
He shook his head at his friend’s questioning looks.
“Nothing,” he began, then was silenced.
By a noise; a thump and what sounded like a low moan.
Coming from the door they hadn’t taken.
Wulfgar looked up at Rydra, who motioned the group into a tighter circle.
“Tank, rogue, Bear, Aos Si,” he whispered pointing toward Lauren, Wulfgar, the dog and Bael, then motioned toward the first door, the door they hadn’t chosen.
“Tank, thief, Prince, Aos Si,” he mouthed motioning toward Snorri, himself, the rat and Tane, and then began moving into the room that Wulfgar and Prince had cleared. “Give us a few seconds,” he said to Lauren, who nodded. He pointed to Doe, then the doorway between the two open rooms; she moved next to the fireplace, on the opposite side from the closed door.
Rydra’s meaning was obvious - the first group would go through the first closed door, the second would move into the further room and go in through the side door. Whatever awaited within the room would be beset on two sides at once - hopefully.
Wulfgar moved to the side, to watch the other group get into place. As Snorri move
d in toward the door, resting his big hand on the latch, Wulfgar looked to Lauren and nodded.
She lowered the handle, softly and quietly, then bulled her way through the door. A split second later, Snorri did likewise and both groups poured into the room, ready for anything. They hoped.
As Wulfgar leapt through the door, the last member of the attacking part into the room, he scanned the space, trying to take the new room in as quickly as possible. It shared dimensions with the room it paralleled; long and narrow with an opening at the far end, but it was furnished more like a hallway. It was empty but for a rug that ran most of its length, as well as a few standing armoire-like cabinets along the left wall.
There was nothing else in the room. Nothing that could explain the noise they’d heard, seemingly coming from the space only a few moments before. The group looked to one another. Rydra raised one finger to his lips, as Doe silently joined the group from the front room. The far side of the room did not end in a door, as the dining room did, but an open portal that lead down into a long, stone stairway, lined with flickering torches. Rydra moved to the top of the stairs and listened for a moment before joining the rest of the group, now huddled in an outward facing circle in the middle of the room.
He leaned in and whispered, “Why don’t you guys check out these rooms,” he nodded toward Wulfgar, “including that closed door in the other room, while I go down there,” he jerked his right thumb in the direction of the stairwell, “and see what’s what.”
Rydra looked to Prince, “Can you stay at the top of the stairs and listen for, I don’t know anything bad that might happen to me?” His face broke into a large smile .
“Yes,” hissed Prince, who moved to the right of the opening. Doe moved in on his flank.
“C’mon Bear,” whispered Wulfgar as he moved back into the room he had first cleared.
Wulfgar leaned in and put his ear on the door, listening. As before, he could hear nothing apart from his own heartbeat. He looked down to his companion.
“Smell anything?”
If Bear did, he didn’t answer.
Wulfgar pushed down on the latch and leaned on the door. As the crack widened, he pushed his blade through into the darkness with his right hand and on the door with his left. Light from the lantern on the end of the long table cast long shadows past Wulfgar as the new room resolved in front of him. It looked like little more than a closet - a pantry.
“Need any place settings?” Wulfgar asked Lauren, standing near and going through one of the sideboard cabinets. He stepped into the closet and looked through the various shelves that lined the walls. Some stacks of plates and boxes of standard cutlery. Nothing more. Nothing of interest. He sheathed his sword and began to go through them, just in case.
After a few minutes, he stood straight, “Disappointing,” he whispered, then felt Lauren move in behind him, reaching around his throat.
“Here you go,” she said, clasping a catch in front of his neck, “I found this in one of the drawers.”
Wulfgar turned and felt the nearly floor length cape swirl around him. He grabbed one side and pulled it in front of himself, the flat black of the cloth felt heavy through his gloved hands.
“Does it go with my eyes?” he asked lightly, turning to face her.
“Kinda does,” she said, looking him up and down. “It’s called the Baen Si’s Cloak. It’ll give you an extra ten percent magic resistance and once per day a twenty-five percent chance of canceling entirely a magical attack. Might come in handy when you’re scouting around downstairs.”
“Damn, I hope not,” he laughed as they moved back within the room and continued searching through the various drawers and cabinets. Apart from the cloak, there was nothing of interest. They looked at each other and shrugged, then began to move toward the next room, to check on the progress of their compatriots.
Then they froze.
They heard the sound again. The thump, followed by a low moan. Exactly as before, and exactly as before it sounded like it came from the next room. They pulled their blades and crouched, then again moved forward to help with whatever it was that had made the low, guttural moaning noise.
Lauren was met in the doorway by Snorri, coming through behind his readied axe. They stood, looking at each other questioningly.
“What the hell …” began Snorri.
“We were just coming in to help you with whatever that noise was,” finished Lauren.
“But we heard it come from in here,” he responded. He looked back and down to the Aos Si standing on his flanks. They nodded.
“It definitely came from your room,” countered Lauren. Wulfgar nodded.
“Someone is fucking with us,” growled Snorri.
“Or something is,” agreed Lauren, she looked up at Snorri, “did you guys find anything? We found a cloak.” Wulfgar spun dramatically to show them.”
Snorri smiled, “Don’t forget to include that when we tally up the loot from this little expedition!” He looked down his nose at Wulfgar in mock seriousness, “Can’t have you getting more than your fair share, newbie!”
Wulfgar nodded as the group moved back into the hallway, “Hey, did you guys check under the rug?” he asked.
“Oh, yeah, you know it,” laughed Snorri, “this ain’t my first crawl.”
Wulfgar held up his hands in supplication, and answered in a Texas drawl, “Didn’t mean to question your abilities there, partner, was just trying to make sure that no stone is unturned.” He looked around the room and did a quick head-count.
“Where’s Rydra?” he asked. He looked to Prince at the top of the stairs, “He should have been back by now. Did you hear anything?”
Both rats shook their heads.
“How long has it been,” asked Lauren, her face suddenly overcome with worry.
“Too damn long,” muttered Wulfgar as he began moving toward the stairwell. “Too damn long.”
Chapter 6
Wulfgar looked down the stairwell, into the first couple of meters of the room below. It seemed, from his vantage, to be well lit. Over lit, in fact. Torches lined the stairway and based on the light levels that he could see in the chamber, it wasn’t just the stairs that were so highly illuminated. He looked back to the group and motioned for them to wait, then began creeping down the stairs.
After what seemed an interminable period, he had descended enough that he could make out what seemed to be most of the room. He crouched, steadying himself on the stone wall, and peered in. The chamber seemed squared, about as long as the hallway above, and he could make out a pedestal, about two meters long and one meter high and wide, in the middle of room. A body lay sprawled, on its back, along the top of the surface. He couldn’t make out much about the person, but he could tell that it wasn’t Rydra. His beard and braided hair draped over one end, while his long, white, body lay naked on the stone, his arms hanging outward and down from the side of the marble bed.
Wulfgar waited a moment, looking and listening. Silence. He moved to the right, to the opposite side of the stairway, to try to take in as much of the chamber as possible. There was only more of the same. A large square room, the walls lined with torches, and three closed doors - one on either side and one on the far wall - all surrounding what looked like a sacrificial plinth in the middle of the room. He crept to the bottom of the stairs, to take in the rest of the space. It added nothing new - and there was no sign, anywhere, of Rydra.
He moved as quietly as he could into and through the room, pausing at each door to listen. Nothing. He considered, for a moment, opening one of the doors - just for a peek - but decided against it.
“Best to have my backup ready,” he muttered as he made his way back toward the stairwell. As he moved through the room, he looked down at the man on the pedestal, but he could glean no new information about him. He looked to be about thirty, with sun-darkened arms and head. His hands were noticeably rough and calloused.
Then Wulfgar froze in mid-stride.
Th
ump and moan.
Again, it sounded like it came from the next room - but he couldn’t tell which one. Whether it was through the door behind him or one of the ones on his right or left, he couldn’t be sure.
He suppressed a nervous giggle, and whispered, “You can’t really die, you can’t really die, you can’t really die,” as he quickly made his way into the stairwell. He felt invisible hands reaching in from behind, to grab and drag him to some stone plinth to await some unnameable horror, then he took the stairs, two at a time, and burst forth back into the hallway, breathless, his heart threatening to pound its way out of his chest and up through his throat.
He tried to compose himself as he looked around, to prevent his friends from seeing just how rattled he was.
But the room was empty.
Wulfgar ran to the side and, thrusting open and through the door, into the dining room. He looked around, frantically, but it, too, was empty. He ran to the pantry and stuck his head through. Empty. Panicking, he turned and fled to the main room, to the little sitting room with the comfortable fire. He expected to see his friends, sitting around the fire, waiting to surprise him and mock his terror.
Empty.
He forced himself to stop, to breath, to try to regain some semblance of control, to think.
“What the fuck?” he muttered. Where could everyone have gone? He looked to the front door of the little room. He couldn’t imagine that everyone would leave the barrow without telling him; without leaving at least one of them behind to let him know; without leaving at least some kind of sign, some signal that they were leaving.
“No,” he thought, “they wouldn’t have left me. They wouldn’t have even left the hallway without leaving someone behind to let me know.”
He could think of no explanation.
“What the fuck!” he grumbled, more forcefully. “OK,” he said in as normal a conversational voice as he could muster, “there has to be some explanation. Even a magical one.” He continued thinking, wringing his brain, trying to explain his situation.