by D. P. Prior
“Do you have any food?” Silas asked. “Only my friend here is sick. He was bitten by a walking corpse. You know, a zombie.”
“Only what I bring back with me,” the cyclops said.
“Don’t want none,” Nils said, curling up on the rug. “Just need to sleep.”
Silas shook him by the shoulder. “Wouldn’t do that just yet, Nils. Let me look for that page again.” The instant the words left his mouth he regretted it.
“Oh, yes,” the cyclops said. “I was meaning to ask you about that book you were looking at when I happened upon you.”
Happened upon? Hardly. The giant had virtually stalked them. How long he’d been standing there by the gate while they struggled along the cliff-top path was anyone’s guess.
“It’s just a book,” Silas said.
“I like books.” The cyclops fixed Silas with a stare of his single great eye. The pupil was the size of a saucer, the iris amber and resembling nothing so much as a crocodile’s. “What’s it about?”
Silas swallowed, did his best to improvise. “Flora and fauna, you know the sort of thing. Boring, really. Stuff about mushrooms and insects.”
“And it will help with the boy’s sickness?”
“Maybe,” Silas said. “If I can find the right page.”
“Let me look,” the cyclops said. “I’m good at finding things. Big eye like this has some advantages, you know.”
Silas covered the book bag with his arm. “It’s all right, thanks. I think I can find it now.”
“I said let me look.”
The cyclops held out a big meaty hand and tilted his head, the great eye suddenly feral and predatory.
Shit, shit, shit, Silas thought, racking his brains for a spell that might help. If he could shock the thing and grab Nils, they might be able to make a run for it.
The cyclops twiddled his enormous fingers impatiently.
Shock! That was it. The words of the casting danced through Silas’s mind, his lips moving as slightly as a ventriloquist’s as he reached over and grabbed the cyclops’s thumb. A sparkling charge of static shot down Silas’s arm and burst into blue fire that consumed the giant’s hand.
Consumed, but did not burn.
“Oh,” Silas said.
“Uh uh.” The cyclops wagged his finger. “You’ll have to do better than that.” He leaned forward, pushed Silas gently back with one hand, and took the bag from him with the other. “Well, well, well, what have we got here? A grimoire, if I’m not very much mistaken. A grimoire of the eleventh degree, no less. Now what’s a pusillanimous whelp like you doing with something so puissant? No, don’t say anything. You can tell me after dinner.”
The cyclops let out a malevolent chuckle. “Well, maybe not. Remember I said I only had what I brought home with me?”
Silas gulped and wished he’d been able to do something to stop Nameless from plunging to his death. Right now, he’d have given anything to have the dwarf waltz in and take command of the situation.
“Now be a good little wizard,” the cyclops said, “and use that poxy magic of yours to rustle up a fire. Can’t remember the last time I had cooked meat.”
***
At first Nameless thought it was a coral bed, but then he realised that was an effect of the distance. As they drew nearer he could see enormous spires crusted with barnacles, towers swathed in weeds, minarets green with algae, and untold buttressed gatehouses decked with brightly coloured anemones. It was as big as an island, an impossible structure encased in a vast bubble of either water or glass. This was something far beyond the architectural abilities of any race he’d come across on Aethir, outstripping even the magnificence of Arx Gravis. There could be no doubt in his mind what it was they were approaching. This was no mere legend. It was looming right up in front of him, a colossal citadel at the bottom of the ocean, the prehistoric capital of the dwarf lords.
“Arnoch,” he whispered.
“Legends are like dreams,” Abednago said. “Most are based on truth.”
Nameless remembered Shader saying something like that. Many of the dreams of the humans on Earth were but echoes from Aethir, dim reflections of the troubled mind of the Cynocephalus.
“But Aethir itself was dreamed,” Nameless said. “So even my people are not real, if you look at it that way.”
The homunculus gave him the sort of smile a parent might give a child that was just starting to find its way in the world. His eyes sparkled as if within they contained the brightness of a thousand stars. “The dreams of a god are of a quite different order. Quite different.”
Nameless didn’t like where this conversation was going. Already his head was pounding. His brother Lucius was the family philosopher; Nameless was more for strong drink and the thrill of battle. Didn’t mean he wasn’t a thinker, only he preferred more tangible concepts.
“So, he is a god then?”
Abednago shrugged. “Some say so. Others say there is only one true god and that a dog-headed ape falls short of the definition. As do his parents, for that matter.”
The craft shuddered as it passed through the bubble surrounding the city and they turned towards a round stone door set between two towers. Nameless clutched the sides of his stool. They were going to crash, he was sure of it, but at the last moment the craft slowed. A sucking, gurgling sound rolled through the chamber, there was a whir and a click, and then they were still. A hairline crack split the centre of the circular door, which filled the eye-window, and swiftly drew wider to reveal a short corridor that ended in an identical portal.
“Stay seated,” Abednago said. “Then you won’t have to go out the way you came.”
“Thank goodness for that, laddie. I was—Aaagh!”
The stool fell through the floor and came to a jolting halt directly below in the cavernous maw Nameless had entered by.
“Aren’t you coming?” he hollered up to the homunculus.
Abednago peered through the hole left by Nameless’ stool. “Remember the courage we were talking about? This is definitely something you need to do alone.”
“Do what?” Nameless said, feeling his hackles rise.
“We’ve docked at the royal passage. There was once a time this entrance would have been so heavily guarded uninvited guests would have needed an army to get inside. Come to think of it, that’s exactly what some tried. None succeeded. Head through the far doors and keep going straight till you reach the throne room. From there, pray to whatever god you follow and hope for the best.”
Nameless grunted and stood. “Sounds encouraging.”
“And Nameless, be on your guard. The evil that destroyed the dwarves of Arnoch may be impossibly old, but it could very well endure.”
“Now why doesn’t that surprise me? Don’t suppose you have a spare axe, do you?”
“When the mouth opens,” Abednago called from above, “hold your breath.”
“What?” Nameless said, taking a step back. “But I can’t sw—”
The jaws of the fish-craft parted and water rushed in. Nameless gulped in a last breath of air and held it. The tongue poked out, carrying him into the corridor beyond the round opening. As soon as the tongue withdrew, the door snapped shut behind him. The passageway was completely submerged. Salt water stung his eyes and blurred his vision. Froth bubbled around his head, and debris rose up from the floor—ribbons of cloth, dust and weed. Something larger shifted across the bottom—a skeleton, dwarven and draped in rusty mail. The air started to burn in Nameless’ lungs. He needed to breathe. His heart was thumping and whooshing in his ears as he turned back to the entrance and scratched at the stone, seeking purchase, seeking a way out before …
There was a grating sound as the edges of the floor slid back to reveal holes through which the water began to drain away. Nameless tipped his head back and gasped in stale air. The door at the far end slid apart to reveal a long antechamber knee-deep in water, which was emptying amid a great torrent of noise.
Ensconced torc
hes, which should have been too sodden to take, burst into wavering light. Not the light of natural flame, but a mauve radiance that sat like a halo atop each torch. He waited for the water to clear before stepping into the corridor, his footsteps echoing in time with the drip, drip, drip from the ceiling. Following Abednago’s instructions, he ignored the flanking doors running along both walls and approached the stone double doors at the end.
Two crumpled skeletons lay before the doors. Each wore chainmail brown with rust, each carried a spear, and each appeared to have died from horrific wounds. One’s skull had been pulverized, leaving nothing but fragments atop its spine. The other had a gaping hole through its sternum, a crushed leg and a missing arm. The city may have sunk beneath the waves, Nameless thought, but that wasn’t what had killed these two.
He searched in vain for a means to open the double doors. There was no handle, merely a crack down the centre, the same as the doors he had entered the city by. There was an inscription engraved in the stone. He found he had to squint to read it as his vision had grown cloudy and he was sweating once more. The scratches he’d picked up from the zombies were itching like crazy, and one or two of the bites were festering. No matter, he thought, he’d endured worse, and he knew from experience that his body was hardy enough to fight off any infection. Any common infection, he added with a niggling concern, which he banished to the back of his mind.
The letters came into focus, letters he recognised. It was Aeternam script, the same he’d learned from Lucius when his brother had been obsessed with translating ancient scrolls that pointed the way to the black axe. The same he’d struggled to read in Shader’s Liber, and got quite far with, too, until the subject matter had bored him senseless.
He rubbed away some of the sediment from the grooves chiselled into the door and frowned at the revealed word. Genuflectio. Was it an instruction? Was that the key to gaining entrance?
He dropped to one knee and bowed his head. The grating of stone upon stone caused him to look up to see the door cracking open down the centre. Beyond it was an immense chamber forested with fluted columns, a massive dais rising in the centre like a stepped island. There was an intricate throne atop the edifice, carved from stone, and upon it sat the skeleton of a dwarf robed in sodden brown that may once have been crimson. A lopsided crown of gold bedizened with gems sat atop a rusty helm that encased much of the skull, and above the seated figure, floating in mid-air, was a sight that froze the breath in Nameless’ lungs.
A great double-bladed axe hung suspended, gleaming like a small sun. It was a perfect facsimile of the Pax Nanorum, only this one was gold rather than black. He distrusted it instantly. He may have been a numbskull, but he’d be damned if he was going to fall for the same trick twice.
He looked away, scanned the chamber, noting the three other entrances, open archways that led to more torch-lit corridors. Half a dozen algae-coated pillars had collapsed, split in two like felled trees, and there were flights of stairs around the perimeter of the room that led to a gallery. More broken dwarf skeletons were piled up in the corridors, their backs to the throne room as if they’d died defending it. Nameless approached the dais, treading carefully on stone slick with seaweed. Here and there water had collected in pools where the drainage holes had been clogged with debris. He hopped between chunks of fallen masonry until he reached the bottom step and then made his way to stand before the throne.
The dwarf King’s skeleton was intact. Perhaps he had escaped the fate of his brethren and had perished either by drowning, or in some other more natural way. The golden light of the axe glinted from the King’s crown-topped helm and gave a yellowish tint to the exposed parts of his skull. There was a brooding sadness about the figure, and Nameless felt deep in his bones the terrible loss of something that could never be reclaimed. If the legends contained even a grain of truth, the dwarf lords of Arnoch were heroes, each and every one of them, great warriors stubbornly holding back the hordes of nightmare that spilled from the mind of the Cynocephalus.
His heart quickened at the thought he had been brought here for a reason, that fate was at last smiling on him and had offered him a glimpse of what his people—Gandaw’s pale imitation of the lords of Arnoch—could have been. Might still become. That hope alone, so great as it was, set his mind to crying warning. Had he not felt the same way when he’d plucked the black axe from the depths of Gehenna? Had his heart not swelled with pride and the anticipation of a golden age for his people when he returned to Arx Gravis and offered to lead them out of their self-imposed exile?
Nameless turned and started back down the steps. He’d not make the same mistake again. No, Arnoch was just a legend, and whatever this sunken city really was, it had the reek of deception about it.
“Wait,” a voice as dry as dust grated from behind him.
Nameless spun, the breath catching in his throat. The skeleton on the throne held up one bony hand. Its skull pivoted to look at him through empty sockets.
“Have you come back to us?” the King said. “Is it over?”
“What … ” Nameless licked his lips and tried to give his fear voice. “What are you?”
The skeleton looked down at its hands, raised fingers to prod at its fleshless face, and let out a forlorn sigh.
“How long has it been? The city has risen, yes?”
Nameless slowly shook his head. “I came in a magical craft that travelled beneath the waves. The water has just now drained away.”
“And yet years have passed, eating the flesh from my bones.” The King tried to stand but his legs broke away from his torso and he had to remain seated. “Then we failed. The creature must still live. Whoever you are, whatever brought you here, you should go, while you still can.”
Nameless took a step towards the throne. He wasn’t sure whether or not to bow, and elected instead to stand with his arms folded across his chest. “This creature you refer to must surely have perished. Arnoch has been lost to the world since the dawn of history.”
The King looked up at the axe floating above his head. “No, it lives. Even after all this time it lives. See how the Pax Nanorum still glows in warning.”
Pax Nanorum. Just the mention of that terrible name sent Nameless to his knees. Tears welled in his eyes and his limbs began to shake. “No more,” he said through chattering teeth. “No more. Leave me alone. Haven’t I done enough already?”
The King turned his empty eyes back towards Nameless. “What is it, my brother?”
“The axe. I have seen it before; held it, but back then it was black.”
“No,” the King said. “It has always been thus. I was present at its forging.”
“But the name …”
“ ‘Peace of the dwarves’. It is written in the old tongue upon the haft.” The King gave a grating laugh. “Old tongue, indeed. Old even when Arnoch was young.”
“But I wielded the Pax Nanorum,” Nameless said, each word a poison to be spat out. “It made me … made me do such things.”
The King reached out a skeletal hand. “Come closer. Let me touch you.”
Nameless rose and stepped towards the throne. He shut his eyes as the King’s cold hard fingers caressed his face.
“There is strength in you. Great strength. I’ve not felt its like since the time of the Arnochian Immortals, the chief of whom the Pax Nanorum was made for. The full power of the axe has lain dormant since the last Immortal was slain in the Demon Wars, back when Arnoch was still young. There is something else, as well. You are unwell. A fever? An infection perhaps? Whatever evil resides within you now, it is not moral.”
Nameless mopped sweat from his brow. His limbs had grown icy and leaden. He could have sworn he was coming down with a cold, maybe something worse. What was wrong with him? Normally he’d have shaken off infection without barely noticing it. Was it the zombies? Had they afflicted him with some vile magic?
“The axe was destroyed,” Nameless said. “But too late. My people … So many of my
people …”
The King gave a slow nod. “It is an ill fate to be a dwarf. The Cynocephalus dreamed us into being to fend off the horrors of his own nightmares, and it is for that reason the nightmares sought us out, strove to destroy us.”
“But my people are not natives of Aethir,” Nameless said. “Not truly. We were brought from another world and changed by the Technocrat Sektis Gandaw. If we bear any relation to the dwarves of Arnoch, it is by way of parody; caricature.”
The King gestured above his head to where the axe emitted its golden glow. “I know nothing of what you say, only that when you entered Arnoch, the city recognised you as a dwarf, for otherwise the waters would not have drained.”
Nameless opened his mouth to protest but the King silenced him with a wag of a bony finger.
“Touch the axe,” he said. “If you are not of the bloodline of the Immortals, the Pax Nanorum will reject you.”
“I cannot,” Nameless said, sweat running down his face in rivulets. “Not after what happened before. I’m sorry, I must leave.” He turned to do so but stumbled and nearly fell. “What the shog is wrong with me?”
“Please, my brother, touch the axe. There is so little time and I must know. Must know if any of my people survived.”
Nameless took another step down. “They didn’t.”