The Lake of Death

by Jean Rabe

  As much as he was repulsed by his dragon-self, did he truly want to be human? A part of him relished the amazing power of this body, savored the sensations of flight. A part of him didn’t want to give up being a dragon.

  “You said the elf could breathe water, could turn into a fish if she wanted to.” Ragh was standing at the very edge of the water. “You said that.”

  “Yes,” Dhamon snarled, irked that his thoughts had been interrupted.

  “Then let’s wait for her back by those trees like she asked us to. Maybe she can find whatever it is down there that can make you human again. Too bad that crystal ball wasn’t more precise, didn’t tell just what you needed to find. Hope the elf can figure it out. Sure is taking her a while.” The draconian looked over his shoulder. The shade was inviting. “It’s hot out here in the open, Dhamon, and I think the shade would do us both some good. We could cool off some.”

  Dhamon suspected this summer heat didn’t at all bother Ragh. He knew the draconian preferred the camouflage of the shade, however. It was too easy to be spotted in the open, especially against the starkness of the sand and the lake here. The sivak once had been a spy for Sable and was used to keeping to the corners and shadows, so his anxiety had nothing to do with the heat of this late summer day, Dhamon decided. Ragh simply wanted to be safe from any prying eyes.

  “I’ll wait for Feril right here, Ragh. You go ahead.”

  “Fine. Fine. Fine.” The sivak ground the ball of his foot into the sand and watched until the depression smoothed itself over. “You wait right here for your precious elf, where it’s all hot and…”

  “You’re the one who persuaded me to leave the swamp. Ultimately, this flying around and exploring was your idea.”

  “My idea? Yeah, but I’m not the one who was looking in the crystal ball looking for a cure. Whoever’s idea it was, it isn’t such a bad one, eh? Not so humid here as in the swamp, and the trees are different. The smells are different.” He wrinkled his nose at Dhamon. “No giant alligators nipping at our heels. You’re back in touch with the love of your life, and she’s trying to make you human again… even though she doesn’t know you’re not going to keep your part of the bargain, even though this elf-lady hasn’t a clue that you won’t donate all your treasure to refugees. All in all, I’d say this is a good venture, huh?”

  Dhamon wondered if he detected a touch of melancholy in the sivak’s tone.

  “We got out of the swamp and far away from Sable,” Ragh continued aimlessly, as he edged back toward the shade, “at least for a while, and I got to see something I never had before… a lake where the mighty elven city of Qualinost once sprawled. It was definitely a good idea, this… holiday away from the swamp. Another good idea is waiting for the elf in the shade, which is just what I’m going to do. You can go ahead and stay here if you want…”

  Dhamon slid partway into the water. “She’s been gone for too long a time, Ragh, too long for my liking. I think I’d better try and look for her.”

  Ragh stopped in his tracks, letting out an exasperated sigh. “You said she can take care of herself, that she can breathe water, be a fish if she wants.”

  “I’ll just take a look. You know I’d rather not.”

  “Yeah, water’s not your favorite element, Dhamon.”

  “Perhaps she needs help.”

  “If she’s some sort of trout swimming around down there, you’re not going to find her. You may as well stand here and burn in the sun.”

  “She can find me. I think I’ll be rather easy to spot,” Dhamon said as he moved out into the warm lake water. He shuddered, though not from the chill of the mist. No, he didn’t really care for water. “I can hold my breath a long time.”

  “Fine,” Ragh cursed, kicking at stones on the beach. “Fine. Fine. I’ll wait for the both of you in the shade.” He struck out toward the oaks and only once glanced over his shoulder. He noted that the surface of the lake was as flat as glass behind the dragon, not even a ripple remaining in Dhamon’s wake. The sand had also smoothed itself again. “Like you say, dragons are easily noticed.”

  The shadows cast by the thick oaks felt cool washing over the sivak’s scaly hide. But he couldn’t enjoy himself. He looked out at the lake, muttered a string of curses, and grudgingly headed back toward the bank. “I’ll wait for you, Dhamon Grimwulf. Just don’t be down there too long. I like this place less and less.”

  The deep lake water was painfully cold, and whatever had a hold of Feril’s wrist was strong and equally painful and only added to her misery. It continued to pull her down swiftly. The pressure against her ears tightened, and the water that coursed through her gills felt like ice. She focused on her wrists and saw what at first she mistook for wispy vines, as if emanating from some plant that grew in the watery depths, hut as she peered closer, she realized that the tendrils were instead ghostly, gloved fingers. She fought against the grip, staring harder into the dark blue below her and finally making out the specter of a man. The specter was wearing transparent armor, with the faintest mark of a lily on his breastplate.

  The ghost of a Knight of Neraka, she thought, as she struggled even more futilely. How could something that looked so insubstantial be so strong? How could those no longer a part of this corporal world hold and hurt the living?

  “Join me.” The words came from the specter, sounding thin and hollow.

  No, Feril raged.

  “You are not strong enough to resist,” the dead knight insisted. “Join me. Together we will protect the Fallen Queen.”

  What Fallen Queen? Feril thrashed wildly, trying to pull herself free from the icy grip of the strange specter, but the ghostly fingers only tightened, and Feril felt her willpower, her life, slipping away.

  “You are not strong enough to fight me, elf. Join me in the Lake of Death.”

  The water became an intense green color as she was pulled farther down.

  “Join the Fallen Queen.”

  By Habbakuk’s fist! Feril looked, blinking furiously. The green stretched as far as she could see and was coming more into focus the closer to it the dead knight pulled her. The green appeared to be the bloated corpse of the overlord Beryl.

  She couldn’t see all of the huge carcass—only the head, neck, and just beyond its shoulder blades. Its front claws were outstretched and its head rested between them. It looked almost as if it was sleeping. Its horns curved up, looking pale like the specter and breaking the wall of green. Its massive eyes were closed, and for a moment she thought it looked peaceful and beautiful. How big the corpse was, she could only guess. A green mist and dark waters concealed most of its bulk.

  Scales glimmered faintly along the dragon’s neck, and in places some of them were broken apart—with elven long swords lodged between some of them, spears, and the rotting shafts of arrows sticking out of the dragon’s head. From a closer look she could tell that two talons were broken, and there was a long slash in one of the front legs.

  The dragon had died a long time ago, Feril thought to herself, wondering why the beast hadn’t started to rot; that was puzzling, but something Feril decided she would mull over later—after she was far away from the dead knight.

  “Join me,” the ghost droned, still pulling her down deeper. “Join my brothers in service to the Fallen Queen.”

  Other images were coalescing around the spines that ran down the dragon’s neck. More ghostly Knights of Neraka, floating shoulder to shoulder as though in formation. There were a few elves among them, and Feril wondered if these were the spirits of Qualinesti who died in the battle against Beryl or other visitors to the lake who had foolishly entered the water and been conscripted into the dead army.

  I’ll never join you, Feril thought, redoubling her efforts to squirm free. Despite her considerable strength, she couldn’t break the specter’s grip. In that instant she finally realized brute strength alone would not work, so she opted for a different tactic. She closed her eyes and pictured one of the catfish she’d seen ear
lier. She began to change her form—waver and shrink, arms thinning and receding, gradually slipping out of the dead knight’s grasp. While the process was not painful, it was uncomfortable and unsettling, and the intense cold made it even more precarious. Her teeth chattered and she shivered uncontrollably as her legs grew together to form a tail, her feet flattening into fins. Her tanned skin turned black and her leather clothes and elf features appeared to melt away.

  Smaller, she urged, much smaller. The specter made one last grab at her as the still-mutating fish-creature finally darted away and up, beyond its clutches. Smaller still, she commanded herself. Only a foot long now, the fish-Feril swam faster, angling sharply away from the carcass of the overlord.

  When curiosity got the better of her and she finally looked hack, Beryl’s head was all she could make out, that and the small wispy forms of the dead knights clinging like moss to her scales. The dead knight intent on capturing her seemed to have vanished. After a few moments, she turned around and swam closer to the dragon’s nose, cautiously, so she could get a better look and so she could see if the undead paid her any attention. The water was still painfully frigid, but her catfish form tolerated the cold much better. She was quick to learn that the spirits of the knights and elves were uninterested in any small fishes.

  There were decaying trees just beyond the dragon’s snout and what looked like the remains of a marble fountain. There were plenty of bones, too, human or elf, Feril guessed, deciding not to get that close to find out for certain. Pieces of plate mail, shredded tabards, shields, helmets, quivers, and more were scattered around.

  The dragon probably collapsed on her Knights of Neraka and the elves, on the fountain and who knew what else as it died. Feril tried to picture the dragon’s final minutes and its fall, the impact its massive body made and that caused this huge crater near the White Rage River and the creation of this—what did the dead knight call it?—this Lake of Death. An apt name, Feril mused to herself.

  How was there so much magic in the dead dragon that it kept the corpse perfectly preserved and kept the lake so still? Feril wondered. It was so oddly cold at this depth, yet warm and still and inviting near the surface.

  Perhaps it was the unnatural cold that kept the fish away from these ghostly depths, or perhaps there was some other magical boundary that separated the realm of the living from Beryl’s realm of the dead. Nothing seemed to prevent Feril from exploring deeper, though the cold was threatening to drive her away.

  Despite her trepidation, she swam closer still, until the dragon’s visage filled her vision. Her eyes searched the broken objects on the lake bed amidst the traces of the undead. Feril’s catfish eyes were acute, so she could tell that everything around the dragon was rotting, and therefore had been there for some time. Everything but the dragon itself was rotting. She couldn’t get over the size of the overlord’s head. She’d seen Beryl once before, when the dragon was alive. It was at the Window to the Stars but that was years ago, another lifetime it seemed.

  Even in death the overlord looked impressive. Feril wanted to swim all the way around the dragon, inspecting the items and objects scattered around it and studying the diaphanous knights and elves. The murkiness and green mist that cloaked much of the dragon and the faint glow coming from its depths was unsettling.

  Not worth pursuing at the moment, she thought. Feril wasn’t sure what she was looking for and wished Dhamon would have given her some specific clue. She didn’t see anything that looked like a magical item lying around. Perhaps she ought to go back and find a sorcerer who could more aptly consult Dhamon’s crystal ball. Perhaps, after all, Dhamon was better off as a dragon.

  Yes, maybe Dhamon is better off as a dragon, Feril mused as she finally turned and sped away from the dragon’s snout. She wondered if she could find happiness in such a form, but she sensed that Dhamon wasn’t very happy and that being a dragon didn’t suit him. Didn’t she prefer Dhamon as a human?

  Feril suddenly realized she was disoriented. She didn’t know where she was, where to swim, or even how far out and deep down she was in this well-named Lake of Death. She swam closer to the bottom and started circling outward, passing over more decaying tree trunks and dead bodies, shattered weapons, then bigger, fallen columns and strewn rubble from homes. Beyond this—beyond all this—she could see several virtually intact buildings.

  Qualinost.

  She stared wide-eyed. The city beyond these first destroyed buildings appeared as though from a lost dream, artful spires rising from the lake bed, courtyards sprawling, exquisite statues attesting to the talent of the greatest of Qualinesti artisans. With her catfish eyes she could make out the colors through the water, the buildings ranging from white to pale brown, all of them with pastel trim and intricately carved doors and shutters, all of them slimed with algae and rot. She half-expected to see dozens of elves walking from place to place carrying out the routines of their lives, but nary a fish swam by, and she knew the water was as cold and tainted as it had been next to the dragon’s corpse.

  She couldn’t see all of the city, suspected she was seeing only a small outer portion of it, and she felt her emotions well up, a great pang of sadness, wishing that she had visited this glorious place years ago when it was full of life.

  There would have been libraries to explore and sages to greet in their homes, places where the greatest of elf sorcerers once lived and apprentices studied. Qualinost would have been a good place to spend hours researching practically any subject, she thought. It was such a magnificent city—once. Now it lay deep under the Lake of Death, smothered by the dark blue water.

  Where to start? Where in all of this do I start?

  She swam toward a low building with curved sides. A row of twisting tree trunks paralleled what looked to be the front of the structure. Feril imagined they were once birches, judging by the few papery white pieces of bark that clung to their bases. Nearly all the trees she saw were black and gray sticks, looking like silhouettes against the pale buildings and deep blue of the water, like charcoal slashes on a canvas. Like a winter scene, with the leaves missing.

  The leaves and the life gone forever, she thought. Qualinost, one big cemetery, the buildings and trees markers attesting to the greatness of elven dead.

  Sadness overwhelmed her as she wove around the twisting birch trees and followed the wall of the curved building. Perhaps this was a library, certainly a building meant to be used by citizens, its design inviting. A place to start her investigations? She wished Dhamon was here to see this and advise her. Though it was depressing to think that centuries of civilization were buried in this lake, the sunken city retained some of its former allure, and she wished to share that with him.

  As she neared the building, she reached inside herself and found the familiar magical spark. She coaxed it to brighten and forced the energy into her tail and fins, regaining her legs and arms and elf size. The catfish skin became her leather tunic again, and her fingers pulled her through the water. She retained her gills, a necessity, but released her acute catfish vision and took back her own eyesight. Despite the depth, she could see well enough. The cold was still intense.

  The building she approached had carvings arching above a skewed, ironbound wooden door. The carvings were tiny and precise, showing elf children playing with small catlike creatures. A stately elf matron supervised them. Other carvings running the length of the door showed children carrying runes of an Elvish dialect Feril was only passingly familiar with. “Senaril t’ Deban,” she made out. “Deban’s gifts,” she thought it meant. It would be better if it translated as “warm inside,” she thought to herself wryly.

  She wrapped her fingers tightly around the door handle and pulled. The iron was rusty, the wood warped, and coupled with the water pressing against it, she couldn’t budge it open. Odd, there were no windows. She swam up to the roof, looking for a window or skylight and finding none. The Kagonesti told herself she should move on. A hundred buildings were in her line of
sight, but this one had aroused her curiosity, and so she returned to the door and pressed her fingers against the wood.

  Move for me, she implored. Damn my curiosity. Move!

  Her energy spread from her chest and down her arms to her fingertips and into the wood. Her magic warped the panels just enough in the frame so that it burst open on its own accord. Soft yellow light spilled out, and Feril slipped in.

  Amazing, she thought, again wishing Dhamon were here to see all this. The building consisted of one large room, and it was filled with a multitude of sculptures. At first glance she could tell that most of them were elves, and most of them were artworks of children caught in various poses of play. The nearest child stretched for a butterfly; another was of a young boy with a large frog in his hands. Beyond these pieces were sculptures of older children, and at the far side of the room Feril saw the adult figures. Perhaps this showcased the stages of childhood. Paintings on the walls, faded terribly by water, were of elf infants.

  The other sculptures were of woodland creatures, centaurs, and small winged fey that Feril suspected lived only in the artist’s imagination. The works, so similar in style, she could tell were all created by the same individual. A lifetime of sculptures and work this room represented. There were hundreds, she realized after staring into the far corners of the room, most of them small, but many life-sized, and some double and triple the size of a natural subject. It would have taken hundreds of years to produce all of this art in such detail, Feril knew. A lifetime of work ruined with the dragon’s death and swallowed up by the lake.

  She forced herself to ignore the persistent cold and wound her way through the gallery, touching the elf boy with the frog and finding the stone pleasingly smooth. Feril ran her fingers over each sculpture she passed, discovering that some were of the same individual, though captured at different stages of childhood. Occasionally she glanced up, marveling at the light that shafted in from the ceiling. It came from an enchanted crystal that hung by a gold wire and cast an even glow over the artworks. She’d seen such magical baubles before, but when she swam up to inspect this one, she discovered that it was especially meticulous—pear-shaped with silver leaves and a stem. From her ceiling vantage point, looking down over the room, she spied small crystal figurines arranged at the bases of some of the larger statues—pieces of fruit, diminutive animals, vases, and mushrooms. She stole another glance at the enchanted, pear-shaped crystal.