Ursula snorted in derision. “Uh, nope. He didn’t have enough power. No laamuffal does.”
“But if he wanted to harm her,” I said, “could he somehow get the power to do it?”
She shook her head. “Not really, although you could always poke around the Relic Room and see if something there would suffice.”
I looked at her with open curiosity. “What’s the Relic Room?”
Eyes twinkling, Ursula stood up and reached across the table, taking my hand and pulling me to my feet.
Chapter 26
“The Relic Room,” Ursula announced proudly, apparently pleased by the fact that I — looking around almost in wonder — seemed to be impressed.
We were in a spacious chamber — the place Ursula had dragged me to after taking my hand. From what I could tell, it consisted of several interconnected rooms, the most dominant feature of which were recessed art niches that covered every wall from floor to ceiling. Each was cylindrical in shape with a domed top, and roughly two feet tall and one foot wide. Moreover, almost every niche was occupied by a curio of some sort — usually a crystal or jewel, but sometimes an unusual stone, metalwork, or some combination thereof.
In a similar fashion, the floors in each room were occupied by what I’d describe as open display cases. Like the art niches, these also contained an assortment of bibelots. In addition, most — but not all — of the items in the room seemed to glow softly, bathing the chamber in eye-catching, multi-colored light that was almost breathtaking.
“You asked about laamuffals somehow getting additional power,” Ursula continued. “The relics in here could be used for something like that.”
“So wait,” I muttered, dwelling on what she’d just said. “All these items bestow some kind of power?”
“‘Bestow’ is probably inaccurate. Rather, the relic contains power that someone could use.”
“Where do they come from?” I asked, glancing around.
“Many were fashioned by Incarnates. Others, we just don’t know.”
I scratched my temple, thinking. “Why would an Incarnate create a relic? If they wanted someone to have certain powers, why not just give it to them — the way Endow did with that driver?”
“We’re not built like Incarnates,” Ursula explained. “Physically, we’re nowhere near as durable. Having too much of their power conferred on you would burn you to a cinder.”
“I get it,” I said with a nod. “It’s kind of like wiring with too much current running through it.”
“Exactly. So the way around that is to imbue an object with the necessary power that the individual in question can access.”
“That makes sense,” I acknowledged. “So, what’s here that might allow a laamuffal to power up to the next level and take on an Incarnate?”
Ursula glanced around with a doubtful expression. “I don’t know what every relic is fully capable of, but I’m not aware of any that can do what you’re suggesting.”
“There’s got to be something,” I insisted. “For instance, I’ve heard of an object that a person can use to siphon sivrrut from an Incarnate and use as their own.”
Ursula just stared at me for a moment, and then mumbled, “The Kroten Yoso Va.”
“Yes,” I said with a nod.
She bit her lip, looking pensive for a moment, then seemed to come to a decision. “Follow me.”
Without a word, she turned and began walking through a nearby corridor.
Chapter 27
We ended up in a small anteroom that was about ten-by-ten feet in size. It was connected to the main chamber of the Relic Room via a few narrow passageways, and was — to my surprise — the only place in the area that didn’t have the ubiquitous art niches on the walls. (By contrast, even the corridors that we passed through en route had contained the floor-to-ceiling relic niches). In fact, the room was almost completely empty, which — in comparison to the rest of the chamber — gave the place a resolute and reverent atmosphere.
The only items in the room were three ornate metal rods jutting up from the stone floor near what I’d call the front of the room. They were about four feet tall and arranged in a row from left to right. The tops of the of the rods were actually splayed, flaring out into numerous prongs that — upon inspection — appeared to be designed to hold some object in place. As a matter of fact, the center rod actually was holding an item. Recognizing it, I could do nothing but stare at it as if in a daze.
“This is the Optimum Alcove,” she stated, making a gesture that encompassed the room. “It’s where the Triumvirate is housed” — she pointed with her chin toward the metal rods — “the three most powerful artifacts in existence.”
She walked toward the rods, with me, still in something of a trance, following behind her.
“Only one of them is here now,” she continued, coming to a halt right in front of the metal poles. “It’s–”
“The Beobona Onufrot,” I interjected, finally coming back to myself.
Ursula gave me a look that bordered more on shock than surprise — as if I were a mongrel dog that had suddenly started discussing particle physics.
“Yes,” she finally said with a nod. “That’s one of its names. You’ve heard of it?”
“I’ve come across it in the past,” I stated, staring at the object in question.
The Beobona Onufrot (or “Beobona” for short) was a cylindrical crystal about a foot long and roughly two inches in diameter. I had already known it to be an ancient and powerful artifact — truth be told, it had saved my life on several occasions — but I had no idea that it was connected in some way to Incarnates. (And if what Ursula had just said was true, it was far more powerful than I had ever imagined.) What it was doing in this place, here and now, was completely beyond me; to the best of my knowledge, it still resided in what could best be described as a weird suit of armor back on Earth.
Before I even knew I was going to do it, I reached out and grabbed the Beobona.
“No! No! No!” Ursula screeched as I lifted the crystal from its setting among the prongs. “You can’t–”
She stopped mid-sentence as brilliant light of every hue seemed to flare up all around us. Ursula squinted, bringing a hand up to shield her eyes while I, almost as a reflex, cycled my vision to the spectrum until I could see almost normally.
At that point, I realized that the light wasn’t exactly coming from around us, but from the corridor we’d used to get to the Optimum Alcove. All of the relics in the niches there — in the entire Relic Room, I sensed — were now beaming as if they contained thousand-watt bulbs. Understanding immediately that this was related to my handling of the Beobona, I hastily put the jewel back. As expected, the light died down immediately, and I cycled back to my normal vision.
“Sorry,” I mumbled as Ursula lowered her hand and rapidly blinked a few times.
When it appeared that her vision was normal again, I found her giving me a curious stare.
“Who are you?” she finally asked.
“I’m Jim,” I answered, laughing, “as you already know.”
“No,” she muttered, shaking her head. “I mean, how’d you do that?”
I shrugged. “I don’t even know what I did.”
“Well, you touched the Beobona, for one thing.”
My eyebrows went up. “Is that against the rules?”
“Honestly, I don’t know,” Ursula admitted. “The thing” — she motioned toward the Beobona — “is here so randomly that it’s never been an issue.”
“What does that mean?”
“It means the Beobona kind of comes and goes as it pleases,” she stated. “It’s almost as if the thing’s alive.”
I didn’t say anything immediately, but Ursula’s statement actually coincided with my own experiences with the Beobona. The jewel regularly seemed to act as though it had a mind of its own.
“Okay,” I finally droned, “but I don’t see how that actually translates into look-but-don’t-touch.�
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Ursula let out a sigh of frustration. “I guess you missed the part where I said it was one of the three most powerful artifacts in existence. That being the case, no one has to tell you not to touch it. It’s implied.”
“Great,” I muttered sarcastically. “Scold the new guy for not reading the unwritten rules.”
Ursula simply looked at me for a moment, then started giggling.
“Okay, fine — you get a pass this time, rookie,” she quipped. “Now, back to what I was saying: the Kroten Yoso Va, like the Beobona, is part of the Triumvirate. It can be used, like you said, to take an Incarnate’s sivrrut and use it for your own purposes. The problem is that it’s a lot like putting a three-year-old into a crane swinging a wrecking ball. They have a lot of power at their fingertips, but do they really know what they’re doing? They’re just as likely to crush themselves as anything else.”
“I get it,” I said. “Having power is one thing, but knowing how to use it is something else.”
“That’s why — if used for its true purpose — the Kroten Yoso Va would only be utilized to take power from an Incarnate.”
I frowned. “You lost me. How’s that different than what we were just saying?”
“We were talking about taking an Incarnate’s power and using it. Although the Kroten Yoso Va lets you do that, if employed as intended, you’d really only take power — presumably from a rogue Incarnate who’s abusing his authority. That’s what it was created for.”
“So that raises another question: who created it?”
She shrugged. “No one knows, not even the Incarnates. No one knows how any of the Triumvirate Relics came into being.”
“But they’re usually kept here?” I asked, gesturing toward the metal rods.
Ursula’s head kind of seesawed from side to side for a moment as she said, “Yes and no.”
I raised an eyebrow. “Care to explain that?”
“Well, as I mentioned, the Beobona kind of comes and goes as it pleases. The Kroten Yoso Va is supposed to go on the right, but it’s only here during those times when it doesn’t have a Keeper.”
“Wait,” I uttered a little forcefully. “What do you mean by ‘Keeper’?”
“The Kroten Yoso Va is intended to keep Incarnates in check. That being the case, it’s not supposed to be in their possession. Ergo, although it can be given to a Chomarsus for safekeeping, it’s usually entrusted to the care of a virtuous and principled individual who’ll only use it as intended, and when necessary.”
“You mean a normal person.”
“Correct.”
“But if that’s the case, what’s to keep an Incarnate from just taking the Kroten Yoso Va from the Keeper?”
“There are allegedly protections in place — presumably something that will drain the power of an Incarnate who tries to take it from a Keeper by force.”
“Well, could an Incarnate fashion a knock-off of the Kroten Yoso Va — something that would let him steal sivrrut from another Chomarsus just like the real thing?”
Ursula seemed to consider this, then shook her head. “I don’t think so. To make it that powerful, an Incarnate creating it would have to imbue it with so much of their own potency that they’d drain themselves.”
“But what if they had another source of power, to either fuel their knock-off or replenish their own sivrrut?”
She frowned in concentration. “Like what?”
“The Beobona,” I said, gesturing toward the artifact.
Her eyebrows went up. “It can do that?”
Suddenly I wanted to kick myself. I felt like I could trust Ursula, but in my current situation knowledge was power, and I’d basically just given up a key piece of intel.
“Uh, I don’t know,” I mumbled. “I just remembered you saying it was a powerful relic.”
“Hmmm,” she muttered, sounding skeptical. “Well, I’m not sure I can answer that. However, there’s a legend that says if a person brings together all three parts of the Triumvirate, they’ll become, like, a super-Incarnate.”
“Really?” I said, trying not to sound as surprised as I felt.
“Yeah, but it’s unlikely to happen because, according to rumor, these things move through time,” she stated.
I didn’t say anything, but that somewhat jibed with my past experience involving the Beobona. At the very least, it had — at one juncture — seemed to be in two different places at the same time. (In truth, based on the known facts, that was probably the case at present.)
“On top of that,” she added, “the Third is missing.” As she spoke, she motioned toward the metal rod to the left of the Beobona.
“What exactly is the Third?”
“That’s the thing,” she said, sounding exasperated. “No one knows. It’s always been missing, so nobody has a clue what it is, where it is, when it is, or what it looks like.”
I mused on that for a moment, then stated, “Maybe that’s the point.”
“What is?” Ursula asked.
“Maybe whoever created the Triumvirate didn’t want them brought together.”
“Then why create them at all? Why go through the trouble of creating something like the Third — whatever it is — just to hide it in the dark recesses of space and time?”
I shrugged. “I’m guessing that’s something that may only be figured out by the person who brings them together.”
Chapter 28
Ursula really didn’t have any more information to impart, so she bid me adieu and went back to her duties. I, on the other hand, wanting a little time to digest everything I’d learned, eschewed teleporting to my room and decided to walk back.
I had hoped that talking to the laamuffals would clear things up, but it hadn’t been nearly as helpful as I’d thought it would be. More to the point, I didn’t seem to have learned whatever it was the killer was afraid of me finding out. (Unless it was something too subtle for me to pick up on.) That said, I’d found the information Ursula gave me on the relics to be interesting, to say the least.
I was reflecting on all this when I caught movement with my peripheral vision. I was passing through a midsized room at the time, which was decorated with a fresco painted on each of the walls. Turning in the direction of the motion I’d noticed, I found myself staring at a wall that depicted a forest scene: towering trees, thick grass, a babbling brook…
Once again, motion drew my attention, and I was caught off guard by the appearance of a man running through the forest. More specifically, he was running straight toward me.
Oddly enough, it didn’t immediately strike me as bizarre that I was seeing a figure moving in a two-dimensional painting. Aside from being an obvious sign that I was getting far too accustomed to strange occurrences, my only concern was whether or not he was armed. Thankfully, he appeared to be weaponless, but — bearing in mind the recent episode with the statues — I phased and backed up slightly as he stepped from the wall.
He was about my height and perhaps in his late thirties, with hair that appeared somewhat unkempt and a beard that looked a bit scraggly. Likewise, his clothes (which seemed to consist of a pair of khakis and a loose-fitting, long-sleeved shirt) were a bit scruffy as well. Finally, I noted that he was a bit like a ghost in that I could actually see through him.
Almost immediately upon exiting the painting, he began talking to me — imploring, to be honest — and gesturing wildly. On my part, I gave him all due attention, but couldn’t hear anything he was saying. In fact, the only sound I could detect was a curious rumbling that seemed to come from all around us. That said, it was pretty clear that whatever he was trying to convey was important.
Giving up on the verbal path, I reached out for him telepathically and found nothing. It was as if, mentally, he wasn’t there. Emotionally, however, I was able to home in on him, and was surprised by the wide range (and intensity) of emotions coursing through him: hope, fear, doubt, resolve, anger, loss… The feelings were so varied and ranged such a gamut that o
ne would have almost thought the man had multiple personalities.
“I’m sorry,” I finally said, shaking my head. “I can’t hear you.” For emphasis, I pointed to my ear.
Apparently, the man understood, because he stopped speaking and appeared to reflect for a moment.
“Let me get help,” I suggested. “One of the Incarnates can–”
At the mention of Incarnates, the man vigorously shook his head, not just indicating that I shouldn’t get them involved, but practically begging me not to. At the same time, I sensed dread and apprehension ballooning in him with frightening intensity.
“Okay, okay!” I assured him. “No Incarnates.”
The man seemed to relax somewhat, but then began to glance around wildly, as though noticing some change in the environment. It took me a moment to pick up on it, but then I realized what was different: the weird rumbling noise had seemingly come to a halt.
Almost in a panic, the man turned and practically leaped back into the painting. A moment later, he was gone, having disappeared into the illustrated undergrowth.
Chapter 29
I stayed put for perhaps ten minutes, hoping that the man would return and keenly scrutinizing the wall for a clue as to where he’d gone. I received satisfaction in neither regard.
On something of a whim, I extended an arm toward the fresco. To my shock and amazement, it met no resistance when it reached the wall and instead seemed to “enter” the painting and become part of it. Caught completely unprepared by this development, I went so far as to lean forward and put my head into the fresco as well, and found myself actually in the forest it depicted. Completely unsettled by what I was experiencing, I hastily withdrew, and was happy to find myself in the “real” world again.
At that juncture, feeling frustrated and eager to speak to Rune (not to mentioned just a little freaked out), I teleported back to our suite.
*****
I popped up in the living room — and in the middle of a conversation. Sitting across from each other on the couch and easy chair, respectively, were Static and Rune.
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