Death March (Euphoria Online Book 1)

by Phil Tucker

  Lotharia and I darted to the battlements and my throat locked up as as the wyvern glided back into sight, wings catching the thermals, tail undulating behind it. I marveled at its rough beauty and awesome power. We watched as it flew out over the thick forest that stretched across the foothills, dwindling into a speck.

  “We’re going to kill that?” I asked, turning to regard Lotharia.

  “I mean, technically we’ve stated that as a goal,” she replied. I couldn’t help but notice how the soft dawn light brought out the depths of her brown irises and caused her skin to glow. “I don’t think anybody’s hinted at how we’d go about executing it, however.”

  I tried not to let my spirits sink. “We’ll find a way. One thing at a time, though. C’mon.”

  We crossed the top of the wall to the base of the wyvern’s tower, glancing in the forest’s direction as we went. The goblins had told us the barrels were stored in the tower’s top chamber, which made sense: who’d want to carry barrels full of pitch up a bunch of stairs during an attack?

  “Squeeze through the rocks,” Dribbler had said. “Squeezy squeeze. Door broken!”

  I stopped and regarded the massive chunks of rubble that had fallen before the tower entrance, dislodged no doubt by the wyvern’s nestmaking above. Three boulders had crashed down onto the parapet, settling against the tower itself and filling in the doorway.

  “Squeezy squeeze,” I said, peering between the huge rocks. “Yeah, right.”

  The gaps might have been large enough for a goblin, but they were definitely too tight for us. I summoned a ball of Light and sent it dancing through. The goblins had been right about the doorway, however; the falling boulders had smashed it inward. Beyond was a typical tower chamber, circular and filled with the detritus of war. No corpses, but plenty of dropped weapons, and there – six large barrels, tightly sealed and with a black flame painted on their side.

  “Think you can Imbue these boulders with the consistency of soup or something?”

  Lotharia placed her palm on one of them. “It’d take some serious time. These are very big rocks, and my Imbue’s only at basic level.”

  “Well, maybe you can widen these gaps so we can crawl through,” I said. “Then work on them from inside so we’re not exposed out here.”

  “I could do that, sure,” she said.

  I frowned at her tone. “Or…”

  “Or we could work our way up from the bottom of the tower.”

  “You sound surprisingly hopeful for what sounds like a lot more work.”

  “True. But this was Jeramy’s tower. At least, the first three floors were his.” A complex emotion crossed her face – something between yearning, sadness, and amusement. “I wouldn’t mind seeing if we could get inside. Who knows what kind of tools or answers we might find?”

  “If there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s that you don’t break into a wizard’s tower at level four,” I said. “That goes beyond even suicidal optimism.”

  “We wouldn’t be breaking in,” she said. “I was friends with Jeramy. It would be more like a visit. And come on. We need all the help we can get, right? Even one of Jeramy’s lowest level items would be a huge help to us.”

  “I don’t know,” I said. But to be honest, I was getting excited by the idea. I moved to the edge of the parapet and looked down at the doorway far below. “You sure none of the rooms will spontaneously fill with fire or dump lava onto us for snooping?”

  “Well, no, not completely, but we can always ask Jeramy for permission to enter.” She paused, noting my confusion, and quickly explained, “The fake Jeramy. The, ah – well, you see, he created an illusion of himself to act as a kind of doorman. Take messages, let people know when he’d be back. Maybe we can ask him if we can go in? Back in the day, his close circle had access at any time.”

  “Were you part of his close circle?”

  “Not exactly… but close-ish? Come on. There’d be no harm in just saying hello.”

  “You shouldn’t say that,” I said. “That’s a sure-fire way to make sure everything goes to hell.”

  “But…?” She gave me an expectant smile. “You’ll come?”

  “Fine,” I said. “The very least we can do is knock.”

  We made our way back down the goblins’ tower, passing Falkon on the way up with an armload of tools, and then snuck out the front door to sidle along the inside of the curtain wall to the base of Jeramy’s tower. Up to the front door – which was in remarkably good condition – and there I stepped back as Lotharia knocked.

  “Jeramy?” She kept her voice to a whisper. “You home?”

  A window opened in the wall. I mean that literally. One second it was blank rock, the next a rectangle was pushed free, swinging out on hinges, stone changing to four glass panes in a wooden frame. It looked like a cottage window, and leaning out on one elbow was a stocky young man, square-jawed and with an unruly thatch of blond hair framing a jovial face. Tattoos curled around his forearms where they emerged from his rolled-up sleeves, and an earring glinted from his left ear.

  “Lotharia!” His voice was distressingly loud. “I haven’t seen you in what feels like years! Wait. It has been years!”

  “Hi, Jeramy,” she said, voice strained. “Can we keep our voices down a little?”

  “Oh, sure,” said Jeramy, dropping his voice to a cheerful stage whisper. “What’s up?”

  I stepped forward. “That’s not him, is it? I mean, is that— Should I be—” Everything about Jeramy – from the cheerful gleam in his eyes to how natural his smile looked – made him seem real.

  “Oh, no, I’m not the real Jeramy,” said Jeramy. “Just a dashingly handsome copy of myself. A carbonated carbon copy. But I’m afraid I’m not available. Can I take a message?”

  “Actually, we were hoping to come inside,” said Lotharia. She bit the her lip and shot a nervous glance at the stables. “It’s not safe out here anymore.”

  “No?” Jeramy peered past her at the bailey. “Sure looks different. Unless we’ve gone for some kind of frightful post-siege decor? But I’m sorry, Lotharia. You know I love you to pieces, but you don’t have carte blanche access rights. So unless I’ve given you a passcode, I can’t open the door.”

  “Do you know what it is?” I asked Lotharia.

  She gave her head a sharp shake. “No. Um. Can we get a hint?”

  “A hint?” Jeramy chuckled. “I shouldn’t. But what was it Bilbo said? I don’t know half of you half as intimately as I should like; but I like half of you half as much as the lower half of you deserves. Or something like that. Also, I can’t resist playing at riddles. Remember that night I summoned the champagne whale? And you dove inside it wearing only your birthday suit?”

  Lotharia blushed furiously. “Um, yes. I seem to recall something along those lines.”

  I did my best to not grin, but had to admit that the image was… a delightfully evocative one.

  “Well. Here’s the hint, though it’s more of a question: what do I enjoy doing more than anything else?”

  Lotharia didn’t hesitate. “Casting magic.”

  “You’d think, but nope.”

  I looked back at the stable. Was that movement in the shadowed doorway?

  “Gaining power?”

  “Nope-a-dope!”

  Movement. “Lotharia, we’ve got company. We’ve got to go.”

  “Learning about Euphoria?”

  “Nope-a-rope-dope!!”

  “Helping others!”

  “Ha!”

  “Um – furthering the goals of Cruel Winter?”

  “Your friend here’s right. That looks like an ogre emerging from the stables.” The illusory Jeramy frowned. “Which is downright weird. Did somebody ride him here?”

  I went to grab Lotharia by the arm, prepared to haul her away, when something tickle
d the back of my mind. Lotharia had said Jeramy loved absolutely awful puns. And something Jeramy had mentioned after Lotharia had asked for her hint popped out at me. Why had he bothered to mention the champagne whale?

  “Um.”

  Jeramy looked at me, eyebrow raised.

  “You… like having a whale of a time?”

  “Yes! Sharp young lad. Good bone structure. You’ve done well for yourself, Lotharia.” With that, he gave her a salacious wink. The window changed, its sill dropping to the ground, the glass-paned frames turning into a stout wooden door.

  I looked back. An ogre was staring at us, scratching its head. With a grunt, it picked up its club from the shadows and began striding in our direction.

  I mean, despite knowing that it was thirty yards away and that we had an open door right before us my heart began to pound like a mad thing. That was certain death coming to say hello. I didn’t hesitate, but grabbed Lotharia’s hand and jumped inside.

  The door closed quickly behind us, reverting to a seamless wall.

  “We’re not together…” Lotharia’s protest trailed off as we both looked around the bottom-most chamber of Jeramy’s tower. “It’s just like I remember it!”

  We’d entered some kind of library/study/lounge. A huge orrery hung from the ceiling, planets and comets wheeling around a blazing star, planes of different elements intersecting throughout in the forms of sheets of fire, ice, earth and so on. The walls were lined with bookcases of gleaming dark wood on which countless tomes stood behind glass panes. A heavy desk was set at an angle at the back, its surface clean and devoid of all objects. A handful of couches and massively overstuffed armchairs faced each other in the middle around a small table in whose center bubbled a fountain of pink liquid.

  Everywhere I looked I found objects that piqued my curiosity. Countless little curios were secreted amongst the books, from skulls to crystals to small cases to bundles of feathers or dancing motes of light in a stoppered jar. A stuffed blue alligator hung from the ceiling, while a flock of rainbow-hued flamingoes picked their way carefully around the couches.

  I stared at them. “Are those real?”

  “You shouldn’t need me to prompt you to use Detect Magic by now,” she said, voice hushed. “Shield your eyes.”

  I gave a curt nod and activated the cantrip, raising my hand in anticipation of the glow. I was glad I did – almost everything lit up, from the pink fountain to countless objects behind the glass-paned shelves. After a moment the glow grew muted, and I lowered my hand, blinking and trying to focus.

  The flamingoes. They all radiated magic – no, they were magic. I frowned, trying to understand what I was seeing. The golden essence that was the air condensed into their shapes, but without focus points; the glow of their heads was the same strength as that of their feet. They looked like magic balloons, smooth and vacuous and without detail.

  “Not real flamingoes,” I said. “But then…?”

  “Illusions,” said Lotharia. “And basic ones at that. Jeramy was capable of creating exceedingly complex, believable illusions when he wanted – if you looked at them with Detect Magic they’d look as real and complex as any other living being. These are just for fun. But come on. I’m disappointed you haven’t seen him yet.”

  “Seen what?” I scanned the room. It was like trying to pick out a single headlight on a highway of oncoming cars at night. Then I saw it. A humanoid shape standing beside the desk, staring right back at me, outlined in magic but with all the complexity the flamingoes had lacked: his head was dense and swirling like a nebula, while pulses of magic ran through his frame like an ethereal circulatory system.

  I dropped Detect Magic. The space by the desk was empty. “An invisibility spell? Is that Jeramy?”

  “No,” said Lotharia. “And yes, an invisibility spell. I think that’s Worthington, his butler. Hold on. Let’s see if he’ll talk to us.” She circled the couches, passing through the flamingoes, whose forms flickered and solidified around her. Then she stopped and bowed to where the butler stood. “Worthington? It’s Lotharia. We met a few years back – do you recall? You helped me down from the chandelier and brought me a pair of talking slippers.”

  I re-appraised Lotharia. There was clearly more to her than I’d imagined. Diving naked into champagne whales? Getting caught in chandeliers? No wonder she’d earned Carousing: Basic (V).

  The air shimmered and Worthington appeared. He was a robot, bronze-skinned and fashioned in classic art deco lines. He canted his head to one side. “Greetings, Miss Glimmervale. How may I be of assistance?”

  “A robot?” I asked. “I thought Euphoria was high fantasy.”

  Lotharia shrugged. “We’re in Jeramy’s private sanctum. As an archmagus, he already had quite a degree of control over Euphoria, but here? He could pretty much do as he pleased. Though I doubt Worthington would survive long if he stepped outside. Um. Worthington. Do you know where Jeramy is?”

  “He is on the fourth floor, ma’am.”

  “The fourth floor?” I inhaled sharply, eyes widening. “He’s alive? He’s here?”

  “Wait,” said Lotharia. “We looked into the fourth floor. It’s full of broken weapons and barrels of pitch.”

  “Ah,” said Worthington. If his face had been mobile, I’m sure he’d have given us a polite, pitying smile. “The other fourth floor.”

  “Oh.” Lotharia nodded as if that made any sense at all. “Can we speak with him?”

  “But of course. You only need access the fourth floor.”

  “And… how do we do that?”

  “I cannot divulge that information.”

  “Hmm.” Lotharia looked sidelong at me, then back at Worthington. “Well. Can you send him a message?”

  “I am afraid I have instructions not to interrupt him.” This was said with an air of complete finality.

  “Worthington,” I said, stepping next to Lotharia. “Cruel Winter and Castle Winter itself are in dire straits. Can you lend us any objects of power to help us defend it?”

  “I am afraid I have instructions not to let anyone despoil the tower. As such, no.”

  “Rats.” I cast a covetous look around at all the objects that lay on the shelving. They’d all glowed with magic. While I might be willing to confront a regular butler, an archmagus’ butler was a different thing altogether.

  “Thank you, Worthington.” Lotharia stood a little straighter. “We were hoping to climb to the regular fourth floor. Do you mind if we use the stairs?”

  “You have carte blanche access to the amenities,” said Worthington. “That includes usage of the stairs. However, I must ask that you not break the summoning circle on the third floor. That would bring about a ruinous state of affairs.”

  “Summoning circle?” I paused. Those words never implied anything good. “Is there something inside it?”

  “There is,” said Worthington.

  “We shan’t touch it,” said Lotharia firmly. “Now. Is there anything you can tell us about what happened to Cruel Winter? What brought about the siege? Why Jeramy has secluded himself on this fourth floor?”

  “Master Jeramy was perturbed the last time I saw him,” said Worthington. “He was in quite a rush. The siege, if that’s what it was, seemed a great inconvenience. He was engaged in great magics. He said that a formidable trap had been laid for him inside the keep, and retired to his private study to contemplate his next move. He has remained there since. Now. May I offer you some refreshments?”

  I exchanged a glance with Lotharia. “Ah, refreshments? Do we have time?”

  She smiled and sat on the couch. “The barrels of black fire mud aren’t going anywhere. Thank you, Worthington. A gin and tonic, please.”

  I sat on the other end of the couch. “They had those back in the… middle… fantasy ages?”

  “And you, sir?”

  “I�
��ll have a Singapore Sling with mescal on the side.” Lotharia raised an eyebrow. “What? You’ve never seen Fear and Loathing in Las Vegas before?”

  Our drinks simply coalesced along with a silver tray on Worthington’s palm, and he bowed as he served us.

  I took a sip. “Perfect.”

  “Ah, civilization,” said Lotharia, curling her legs under her. “This brings back memories. I thought I’d be doing this the moment I came back, not spending weeks scurrying through Feldgrau like an extra in a zombie movie.”

  I lifted my shot and sipped it. Exceptionally smooth. I drank it slowly, savored the sublime white lightning taste, then set the glass down. “Hey, that zombie movie brought us together. Not all bad.”

  She closed one eye as she looked at me through the narrowed lashes of the other. “No. Not all bad.”

  I snorted and leaned back. The couch was that dangerously soft kind that slowly enveloped you the longer you remained still. “Let me ask you: if you could pick, would you really rather have come back to a decadent party castle? Or, despite the hardships, would you have chosen to go with the reality we ended up with?”

  Lotharia sipped her gin and tonic. “Sign me up for the decadent party castle. You saying they’re even remotely equivalent?”

  “You know, maybe I’m nuts, but I prefer what we’ve got going over some endless surreal party. I’m sure it would have been a lot of fun, but…”

  “But you like being dirty, overwhelmed, and on the verge of death at all times?”

  A dangerous light had entered her eye, and there was a curl to her smile that made me feel intensely aware of the short distance between us.

  “I mean, not when you put it that way. But yes?” I stared down into my drink, trying to focus my thoughts. Looking at Lotharia was becoming too distracting, and I felt a strong urge to articulate what I was feeling. “I felt it when I first arrived here. Before I knew how everything had gone to shit. When I first looked out over the mountains and valleys and saw the forest… I was thrilled. So much unknown. So much to discover. And being in Death March mode made it all the more real.” I risked a glance up. She was watching me over the rim of her glass. “And I’ve never felt more alive, you know?”