by Dave Dickie
“I think anyone moving would cause the glow disks to light up. We would know if someone was about,” said Nyjha.
Stegar nodded. “Yes, but we will remain cautious.” He moved into the room and glow disks lit the area. It was a troll-sized dining room that could have easily held three dozen trolls. On one side of the room were cabinets with glass doors. Behind the glass were tableware, plates, and glasses. They were ornate, the first thing Stegar had seen that didn’t look purely functional. Stegar noticed many gaps in the display, as if some of the items were missing. The chairs were padded. The padding looked serviceable and clean, but was fraying in spots.
Stegar nodded toward a set of double doors that led off the other side of the room. He and Nyjha moved to them, stopped, listened, and when they heard nothing, pushed them open and walked through. It was a combined kitchen and pantry, and it was partially stocked. There was a small room with a thick door that occupied one corner of the pantry. Inside was a cold room with meat and perishables, enough for a number of meals, although the room could have easily held fifty times the amount on display. Stegar pointed to the meat and said, “This is all new, all placed here within the week.” Nyjha nodded his agreement. Another set of double doors led to another corridor. They followed that to where it turned a corner, peered around and saw a second set of double doors. They listened for a moment, then pushed through.
The room they were in was forty feet wide and eighty feet long. They had entered from doors on the narrow wall. The longer walls both sported much larger doors The polearms that had been in place at the temple antechamber lined these walls as well. These, however, looked newer, or at least more polished. There were two missing. Nyjha examined the floor carefully. “Many use this side entrance and the double doors to the left. Only one uses the double doors to the right.”
Stegar thought for a moment. “If this building has the same general layout as the temple, this will be the guard room. This is clearly more of a facility, not a building in a city. The side door,” and he pointed behind them, “is for food deliveries.” He looked at the larger doors. “That one must open to the outside,” pointing to the one on the left, “this one was used by Gruggrul. The side entrance is used by trolls that are trusted, but not allowed the run of the facility. Servants.”
“Regular trolls?” asked Nyjha thoughtfully.
Stegar answered, “So I would surmise. Regular trolls must periodically stock food and drink. In other times, it would be for a large number of great trolls. Now they serve just one.”
Nyjha nodded. “Perhaps Gruggrul was the only survivor after all.”
“Perhaps.” Stegar looked at the door to the outside. “There are two of the polearms missing. I think there may be guards outside the building.”
Nyjha asked, “Why wouldn’t they be in here?”
Stegar shook his head. “I do not know. Perhaps the regular trolls are not allowed in the building except to deliver food. Let us return to the others. I do not want to open either door just yet.”
They backtracked to Hantlin, who looked like he wasn’t sure if he should be terrified or bored, then the three of them returned to Daesal. Beldaer was still studying the console intently. “I think you should look at the records room,” Stegar said, glancing sideways at the door.
Daesal nodded. She said, “I will return shortly,” to Beldaer, but he barely noticed, intent on the console.
Once they were in the other room, Stegar said, “I did not know if we needed to talk privately. I know the elve’s ears are sharp. We have not explored everywhere, but it appears Gruggrul was alone in this place, served by regular trolls. They do not come in the building proper, but use a side passage to deliver food. However, I think they may be guarding the doors outside the building.”
Daesal took a moment to digest that. “Interesting. The console appears to be locked, but there are some commands that are running on a timer. Beldaer has not seen anything like it on the elve’s world gate. He calls this a secondary gate, not as powerful as the one in the temple.”
“Could you understand what it is doing, translating with the amulet?”
Daesal frowned. “More than Beldaer. The information is displayed in great troll, so he cannot read it. As it is, it is not detailed, and I am guessing at some of its meaning. It seems to be a countdown to opening a gate to a place called “the shallow time”. A place, or a plane, or a different universe, it is not clear to me. Why Gruggrul would have that on a timer is not clear either. He could simply activate the gate himself.”
Stegar thought for a moment. “Unless he was disabled or hurt. Maybe it’s a backup plan in case something happens to Gruggrul.” He motioned to the ledgers. “These appear to span many years. Possibly four or five centuries, it is hard to say. And it seems like different trolls may have been writing in it at different periods.”
Daesal nodded slowly. “The shallow time. A place where time passes more slowly. They leave one troll to do research, that troll steps into to shallow time to explain to the others what they have found, then returns. The troll doing the research ages, incredibly fast to the ones in the shallow time. When that troll becomes too old, someone takes his place. Access is on a timer so if something happens, if the troll doing research is hurt or dies, they have a way back. Each new troll is someone from the past, from the fall of civilization.”
Stegar nodded agreement. “The great trolls have been hiding in a pool of time. It would give them a long time to try to determine what humans… what we did to the temple gate. Do you know how long it will be until the gate opens to this shallow time?”
Daesal nodded. “I have an idea, but it assumes the trolls kept time the way we do. There is a number that is changing every minute or so. There are two more next to it. The second one would be hours, or some portion of a day, maybe not exactly an hour. The third one would be days. It numbers three. Then there is another timer that kicks in five days after that, if I have the right of it.”
“And after that?” asked Stegar.
“I do not know, but I would guess the first timer resets. How long it resets to I cannot guess.”
“But three days until the next time it’s active. The fire is burning, then,” said Stegar.
Daesal nodded. “I will tell Beldaer he should focus on the gate while I go through these,” she said as she waved at the ledgers. “You should check the rest of the complex to see if there is anything else of value here.” She frowned. “I am not sure what the right thing to do is. Beldaer is clearly trying to help us, but these gates are a higher priority for him, and I do not know why. If the elves already have these gates, why would they need more? If they merely want to prevent others from using them… well, then I think we have a responsibility to Kethem to try to secure it for ourselves. I do not want to work at crossed purposes, but it is clear to me that Beldaer has an agenda that he is not disclosing.”
Stegar touched his hand to his sheathed sword. “I hope it will not come to that, but if it does, I will be ready. Just give me the sign.”
“I too,” said Daesal. “And Stegar… thank you.”
Stegar looked confused. “For what?”
“For your support. For your skills. For your trust. It is … not something I am use to.” Daesal turned away. Stegar touched her on the shoulder. Daesal was staring at the ground. She said, “I have always been different. My parents did their best to help, but even they at times… I could see they were afraid. Afraid of me.” Stegar just stood quietly. After a few moments, Daesal continued. “I’m capable at magic. A prodigy. My father was a Gold Ring. My path from Copper to Silver was never in question. But--” She paused. “But I needed to know. I needed to know what I am. I travelled for a while. I think the Hold was happy to see me go. I thought I might have found something in Bythe. There were descriptions of someone with darksight, with uncanny senses, that sounded like some of the capabilities I have. I spent some time tracking them down.”
“They were on the mission with
us? Is that why you signed up for the expedition?”
“No. With time and effort, and a friend who is good at uncovering the truth, I found out it was a priest of Sambhal, the demon-god. The dark sight, the superior sense of smell and taste are aspects of their god, ones they do not advertise. But I am not a worshipper of any god. It was a false trail, and the only one I had. I decided to venture outside of Kethem.” Daesal looked up, squared her shoulders, and turned to face Stegar. “When you have no information, a roll of the dice is as good as anything else to make a decision. This was the first expedition out of Kethem I came across.”
Stegar laughed. “Well, I would say you should stay away from the gambling halls, because the roll of the dice put you in the center of a boiling cauldron.”
Daesal smiled back. “Perhaps. But perhaps what I needed more than knowledge was acceptance. Perhaps what I needed were friends I could trust, who I could count on to have at my back.”
Stegar’s smile faded and it was his turn to look down. He said in low voice, “I am your friend, Daesal, never doubt that. But you do not want me at your back. I am not someone you should depend on.”
This time Daesal touched Stegar’s shoulder. “I do not know what it is in your past. I can smell your sorrow. I know you feel like you have betrayed someone you love.” Stegar’s head snapped up and he looked at her with hard eyes. Daesal shook her head and said, “It is not that I have specific knowledge of you. You have noticed my propensity for tasting things. My sense of smell is finely tuned as well. I can tell things about people from their scent. You are one of the most capable people I have ever met. You are a leader, someone that many people looked up to. A Holder, or you use to be. Yet I can smell your despair, your desire to focus on the immediate to blot out the past, your intent to prevent people from expecting anything of you beyond that. This is not someone that lost his position by a mistake, or by a bad roll of the dice. It is someone driven to despair by a personal loss, one they believe they are responsible for.”
Stegar’s face was impassive but his eyes were still hard. “You have an excellent sense of smell, Daesal.”
Daesal said with a look of sorrow. “I am sorry. I did not mean to anger you or open old wounds. I just meant to say that what is past is past. On this journey, you have saved all of our lives several times over. I will not say that it is a counterbalance for this burden you carry. Only you can decide that. But regardless of your past, there is no one I would rather have as my shield arm.”
Stegar stood for a moment. Finally, he sighed and closed his eyes. “What is in my past I will never atone for. But I swear I will see you and the rest home safely, that or die trying.” He opened them again, and the hardness was gone, replaced by determination.
Daesal nodded. “Then let us be about it.”
Chapter Twenty
Daesal was so absorbed in her reading she did not hear Stegar enter, and she jumped when he cleared his throat. She’d been poring through the great troll ledgers. She was on the floor, the troll desk too high to use effectively. She had the blue ledger and two red ledgers out in front of her and had the troll writing stick in her hand. One of the red ledgers was partially full of what looked to Stegar like arcane symbols. Each had a few words in common written next to it. When she looked at him, he frowned. Her eyes were bloodshot and had dark circles under them.
“Beldaer will be awake soon,” said Stegar. “You can sleep while he works on the control panel.”
She shook her head. “No. I will hide this,” and she pointed at the red ledger she had been drawing in. “But he accepts that I am trying to decypher the great troll language with little success.” She had given Beldaer some information, but nothing that could not be surmised without being able to read the documents. He had looked through them, and she could see him stop cold when he saw the gate commands in some of the entries. But then he had handed the ledger back to her without comment, and she guessed he knew he could not stop her and was hoping that they would blend in with the troll writing, leaving her none the wiser.
Stegar frowned and said, “Are you sure he believes you?” Daesal nodded. “Not that he has made any progress on the control panel,” added Stegar. “And perhaps his lack of progress is why he accepts your story. I do find Beldaer a bit arrogant at times.”
Daesal laughed. “Elves in general, it seems. But the elves sit on a high perch. It is only natural.” She closed the ledger she’d been writing in and stuck it in a cabinet.
“And I supposed I should not be the sheep farmer laughing at the siznette herder. I have not done much better.” Stegar and his team had searched the complex and found food, water, and items he took as medical supplies for trolls, stocked for a single occupant, but a very large one. None of it had been helpful. They had found a room with three teleportals, all inoperative. Otherwise, the place had been empty of anything useful. Now they were taking turns at guard duty around the entranceway. Grim had the idea of putting a small brick in the way of the door to the kitchen corridor, and the door had remained open just enough to allow him to see into the room. They had seen regular, brutish lesser trolls once. Those had entered, changed pole arms, and left. Otherwise, all had been quiet.
“Have you made much progress in understanding these?” Stegar asked, waving at the ledgers.
“Yes and no. And yes. The gate is complex. There are commands that can spawn other commands that can spawn other commands. There is a language to it, very precise, very… I will say mathematical, but I don’t mean it as in adding up numbers. Logical, it is logical. The variations are immense. One glyph can mean one thing, but next to another it can mean something else. And the glyphs themselves are related. She sketched a triangle with two lines coming out of the center in the air with her hands. “Open.” She sketched the triangle with a square in the middle. “Closed. A square inside the glyph almost always means it is the opposite of the glyph without it. But the open glyph is not just a triangle. The lines mean something additional.” She shook her head. “You can combine them in many ways. The trolls have been trying every variation they can think of, but I think the main issue is they don’t know what the humans did. It is like trying to find a part to fix a boat, but you have only the vaguest notion of what the boat is, how big it is, whether it is sail or oar-driven. You just know it floats on water. And they seem cautious about trying new combinations.”
“But you have learned many of these commands?”
“Yes. There is enough detail in the ledgers to extract the details from their experiments and why they tried certain things, and I can derive the meaning of many symbols that way. I think there is some base understanding you are assumed to have already that I am missing, but the pieces are falling into place. I know some sequences to do specific things. The power of these gates is incredible.” Daesal stared off into space for a moment. Then she sighed and said, “Do not let Beldaer know. I do not think he would like it that I know more than the simple things he has taught me. But without a working world gate, the commands are useless, and this gate is locked for most actions. I have seen Beldaer try many of the commands to no avail. The great trolls must only unlock it when they are experimenting.”
“So that is the yes and no on progress. But you said yes a second time,” said Stegar.
Daesal nodded. “Some of the experiments resulted in opening portals to other places. Most were uninteresting or inhospitable. But there was one recently that I find disturbing.”
“Recently?” said Stegar, raising his eyebrows.
“Relatively speaking. Twenty-five years ago. A plane inhabited by beings of great power, a plane where chaos was more powerful, the rules that keep it in check in our world less robust.”
“Chaos?” asked Stegar.
Daesal smiled. “Sorry. It’s a relatively obscure area of study in magic, more philosophical than practical. At least, that is, without a world gate. Chaos is a powerful substance that is held in check by the physical laws of our universe, laws that have be
en put in place by the gods. Mana is the power of chaos leaking past those laws. In places where chaos is not bound as tightly, there are chaos feeders, powerful, but volatile. In this case, these beings are hooved, bipedal, black skinned, with flesh hot enough to burn wood if they touched it.”
“Two footed, hooved--the tracks in the cave?” said Stegar.
Daesal shrugged. “Perhaps. I do not understand the connection if they were. But that is not the disturbing thing. The great troll at the time was negotiating with these creatures, thinking they might present an alternate path to performing the transcendance ceremony. He was dealing with two of them, Beludhal and Lerguzohn. They were working toward a common language they could use for negotiating. But one day, he opened the gate and these beings came through with a child. They warned him that others on their side were preparing to come through the gate and seize it. They warned him to close the gate to their plane and never reopen it. According to the writing, they returned to their own plane through the gate and the troll did as they asked, locked that specific destination to a gate key and then put the key somewhere it would never be found.”
Stegar had listened patiently, and he nodded when she finished. “So it can never be opened again.”
Daesal shook her head. “I have come across references to a master key, so I would not say that. But I suspect the master key is well protected, if the trolls even had one.”
Stegar asked, “And why do you find these things disturbing?”
“Because it says that two returned. But if they had a child, it should have been three.”