by Andi Van
“I’m thinking no one has for a long time,” Tasis said. “Do you remember the hidden cave Josephina showed us where they’d originally entombed their dead?”
“We’re where?” Jorget practically yelled.
Kelwin laughed. “It was torn open when the wave hit, man. The bodies were washed into the sea. We’re not going to come across a bunch of corpses.” He raised an eyebrow at Tasis, who was practically beaming back at him. “But I don’t remember this being in that cave.”
“Neither does Josephina. But she swears that’s where you are. She’s on her way to get you out. Shouldn’t be long. She was practically running when she cut me off.”
“Good,” Jorget said with a sigh. Yeah, the poor guy was definitely looking pale.
Kelwin clapped a sympathetic hand on his shoulder. “Agreed,” he said. “Hey, Tas, are you stopping at Arin’s before you board Sireti’s ship?”
“Probably. Why?”
“Because I still didn’t get my sweet rolls,” he answered with a heavy sigh.
Tasis answered with a laugh. “I’ll bring you some,” he promised.
There was a shout from the other side of the wall, and Kelwin grinned at the mirror. “The rescue party appears to be here,” he told Tasis. “I’ll contact you after I’ve spoken to Vashk and had a bath, okay?”
“I’ll hold you to that,” Tasis said with a smile. And then the mirror cleared.
“Put your mirror away,” Kelwin told Jorget in a gentle tone. “We’ll get you out of here.” Then he raised his voice. “We’re here, Josephina.”
There was a grinding sound, and the wall moved to the left a few feet. Once it shuddered to a stop, the white-haired matriarch poked her head into the room. “Well,” she said fondly as she stepped inside to wrap Kelwin in a hug. “You boys certainly do know how to make an entrance, don’t you?”
Chapter 16
JORGET FOUND it impossible to keep his eyes off the elderly elf who’d freed them from their accidental prison. If she had been human, Jorget would have guessed her age around perhaps eighty summers. Quite old, but not unheard of. The fact she’d witnessed the end of the guild’s previous era for herself was mind-boggling, and he found it impossible to reconcile in his head.
“Try to remember to blink,” she said, a smile playing at her lips.
“Sorry,” Jorget said immediately, feeling his face heat. “It’s just….”
Josephina stopped and gave him a kind smile, the sort of smile he imagined a grandmother might give a beloved grandchild. Or at least that was how he’d imagined it as a small child who’d wanted a family of his own, and witnessing it firsthand warmed his heart. “Time seems much shorter when you look back,” she said, patting his cheek gently. “When you’re young, the number of years ahead of you seems vast. When you’re standing at the twilight of life, a thousand years ago was yesterday. There is never enough time.”
“You’re not going anywhere,” Kelwin chuckled. “Come the end of the world, it’ll be you and the cockroaches.”
Josephina gave a disdainful sniff as she gave the other elf a sidelong glance. “I’ll have you know there are no cockroaches on the isle. So it’ll just be me, with the entire library to read.”
Jorget thought that sounded like a pretty good fate, really.
The woman’s gaze roamed around the room, and she shook her head. “I had no idea this was even here. I’ll want the whole story. Tasis was a little hard to understand.”
Kelwin snorted as he shrugged on his pack, then picked up the box from its resting place near the stone circle. “Can’t imagine why,” he said. “I mean, we only disappeared into thin air for several hours. No big deal.”
Josephina gave him a quelling look, but he grinned back, completely unrepentant. She shook her head, then gestured for them to follow her. “Come, let’s get you out of here.”
Despite Jorget’s irrational fear of coming across a stack of corpses, the large area they stepped into was completely bare. Not only was it empty, but it was also lacking a floor, other than the dirt nature had provided, and any sort of ornamentation. It seemed odd to him, and he looked around. “Tasis said this was a tomb?”
“It was,” Josephina agreed, a look of pain crossing her face, there and gone before Jorget could apologize for dredging up bad memories. “Prior to the attacks, mages were cremated by means of a spell. But we were being killed in horrifying large numbers and had no time toward the end.” She cleared her throat, then glanced at Jorget. “Magic preserves things. Including bodies.”
Jorget wrinkled his brow, trying to understand what Josephina was getting at. When he didn’t respond, Kelwin sighed. “Mage corpses don’t decompose,” he clarified.
With wide eyes, Jorget looked at the old elf for confirmation. She nodded, and he swallowed hard, not liking the idea of being a perfectly preserved corpse for the rest of eternity. “Right. I think I’d prefer to be spared that.”
Josephina made a noise of agreement and gestured at the space they were standing in. “Before the attacks, this was a place to say goodbye. The body would rest in waiting for a week while everyone said their final farewells, and then there would be an elaborate fire ritual that always became a celebration of the departed. Death is sad. There is no way around that. But we always found a way to include joy as well.”
“What of the ashes, then?” Kelwin asked. “Were they cast into the sea?”
“No. They’re buried among the trees that make up our small forest and within the gardens surrounding the stronghold.”
Kelwin gave her a look Jorget might have described as horror, but he wasn’t sure why. Buried within the earth, the minerals that make up a body would be good for the soil. Shouldn’t an herbalist be glad for something that would benefit the plants? “Wasn’t Vashk able to resurrect so many guild members because their souls still lingered among the bodies?” the elf asked.
“Yes,” Josephina said slowly, clearly confused at Kelwin’s reaction. “Why?”
“How do you know the souls have departed?”
It suddenly occurred to Jorget what Kelwin was getting at, and before he could stop himself, he laughed. “Are you asking if the forest is haunted?”
“No,” Kelwin protested, his ears going pink. “Well, possibly. But not because I’m worried about ghosts. Aldris and I have been harvesting from the trees and the garden. We aren’t doing harm to anyone who might remain, are we?”
Oh. That made more sense to Jorget, though it was less amusing than imagining the elf who appeared to fear nothing being afraid of ghosts. “How would that hurt them, though? They’re spirits.”
“Spirits whose bodies have been made one with the plant life,” Kelwin pointed out. “Which is how nymphs are made, according to legend.”
“Nymphs are a myth,” Jorget said immediately. But the moment the words were out of his mouth, he groaned. “Just like dragons, merfolk, and gryphons. Right. I forgot.”
Josephina laughed, and it was such a merry sound that Jorget couldn’t help but relax. He noticed the tension seemed to drain from Kelwin too, and they both looked at the woman expectantly. “I’ve yet to find a nymph anywhere on the isle,” she assured them. “Or anywhere off the isle either. No, part of the rituals performed after death includes basically telling the spirit that it’s okay. They don’t have to remain if they don’t want to. I’ve yet to see any signs of ghosts hanging about, but the magic… the magic remains.”
It seemed to Jorget a person’s magic was probably part of their soul. Which meant that the souls of countless mages were probably part of the local flora. He wasn’t sure whether he found that notion disturbing or reassuring. He’d discuss it with Kelwin and Tasis later, where he wouldn’t sound like an idiot. He’d get their take on it.
And it was at that moment he realized he really had found a home. A place where people took him seriously, and cared about what he thought. Denekk had always treated him well, of course, but the priest wasn’t exactly a paternal sort. Then, J
orget had always been a student. Now, he suspected he might have stumbled awkwardly into a family.
He cleared his throat to try to rid himself of the lump that had formed there. “Can we go outside? No offense, but I’m a little tired of places with no obvious way out.”
“I concur,” Kelwin said as he looked around. “So the question is, how do you get out of here?”
Josephina grinned, bobbing her brow in amusement. “Magic, of course.” She whispered a few words, and what appeared to be an entire side of the room vanished. Daro made a noise and immediately dashed for the newly formed exit.
“Better,” Kelwin said with a sigh of relief. He moved quickly, Jorget right behind him, and they didn’t stop until they were standing on fresh grass under the clear blue sky.
Unfortunately, the clear blue sky reminded Jorget of other things, and he found himself staring at the wooden box in Kelwin’s hands. “So now what?”
“Now we talk to Vashk,” Kelwin answered, looking back to make sure Josephina was on her way out of the cavern.
She was, which made her faster than Jorget had expected, given her age. “Keep an open mind,” he reminded himself under his breath. Again, Denekk had the right of it when he’d said Jorget needed to quit making assumptions about people.
When the side of the hill again appeared whole after another whispered word from Josephina, Kelwin spoke again. “Is Triv at the dock?”
She nodded in response, brushing her long white hair out of her face as the ocean breeze stirred it. “I’ve a feeling we’re going to have to build a different dock for Sireti’s ships,” she admitted. “Triv and the rest have pretty much turned the docking cavern into their home.”
“Another cave?” Jorget groaned as he rubbed at his face. He’d seen more than he wanted of them to last several lifetimes.
“This one’s got an opening large enough for a cargo ship to enter,” Kelwin promised him. “It’s not claustrophobic, I promise.”
Small comfort, but Jorget would take it.
“We’ll go through the castle,” Kelwin continued, nodding to his left. “There are stairs going down. Far easier than taking the steps to the beach.”
“The steps to the beach are why I learned levitation,” Josephina told Jorget with a wink.
But he didn’t hear her words. He’d turned his head to look where Kelwin had indicated, and his eyes were transfixed at the sight of the enormous stone structure standing proud and whole. The pale stone practically gleamed in the sun, and more than one window glittered with colorful stained-glass scenes. It was… “Beautiful,” he whispered.
“It’ll do,” Kelwin said with a grin. “It’s certainly better like this than as a pile of rubble.”
“Agreed,” Josephina said firmly. “May I never see that again. Having one’s home destroyed is soul-crushing.” She shook her head, then smiled at Kelwin. “We’ll keep it from happening again.”
“We will,” Jorget agreed. Somehow, they would. He wasn’t going to lose this.
Kelwin nodded in acknowledgment, probably making a fair guess as to what was going through Jorget’s mind. “Come on, you can take in the sights later,” he promised. “We need to get this to Vashk.”
The walk was not as long as Jorget had guessed it would be, or perhaps it was such a pleasant day and he was so relieved to be outside again that time seemed to pass quickly. That the stroll was done in comfortable silence was bliss. Jorget had so much running through his head after the past few days and had been kept so busy he hadn’t had time to process anything. He was looking forward to a solid day in the silence of the library he’d visited in his sleep.
They stopped at the front entrance, two elaborately carved wooden doors with clear glass inset. “This is one of the first things Tasis dreamed of,” Kelwin said, looking at Jorget.
“The doors?” That seemed like an odd thing to dream of.
Kelwin hummed confirmation and gave him a nod. “He was on the beach below, and Triv’s daughter invited him up to the stronghold because the water was coming. He followed her inside, and he remembers watching through the glass as the water rose, to eye level. And then someone behind him spoke, and he turned to see himself.”
“Himself?” Jorget asked, confused.
“Well, it was Triv,” Kelwin said with a chuckle. “But he didn’t know about her then, and you’ve been made aware of how alike they look.”
That made sense. Having seen Triv—or at least a dream version of her—for himself, he’d already witnessed the similarity between them. “Triv had a daughter?”
“Aria,” Josephina answered, sounding a little wistful. “She was only a baby when the king attacked. I took her off the isle myself when Triv made her final stand, and raised her as my own, telling her stories of her parents’ lives. But as I once told Triv, Aria was human, and human lives are so brief it seemed that in the time it took me to blink twice, I was standing beside her grave.”
“She wasn’t one of us, then?” Because if the girl had been a mage, she would have lived longer. Wouldn’t she? Or would a few centuries still seem like only a fraction of a moment to an elven mage?
“No. She was a bright, dear girl who brought sunshine into the hearts of everyone she met, but that was her only magic, and it was magic she created herself with her personality.” She sighed heavily, and pulled a handkerchief from a pocket to dab at her eyes. “I wish she could have known her mother. And I wish Triv could have known her.”
Jorget gave the woman an awkward hug, needing to do something to comfort her, though the urge was more than a little foreign to him. She responded by clutching him to her, and they stood there in silence as she wept into his shoulder. In time her sobs subsided, and she released him to wipe her eyes and blow her nose. When she’d tucked her handkerchief away again, she gave a small sniffle and rested a hand against Jorget’s cheek, looking into his eyes exactly like Tasis had, as if she could see into his soul. And, like he’d suspected of Tasis, maybe she could, but the thought didn’t bother Jorget as much as he supposed it should have. “You’re a good lad,” she said softly. And then she opened the front doors and ushered them inside.
The entry floor was similar to the floor they’d seen upon entering the mountain, and it gave Jorget pause. The starburst pattern was reminiscent of the compass he’d seen there, and he narrowed his eyes. “This is different from the mountain, but….”
“But very much alike,” Kelwin said, looking at the floor with a frown. “Let’s be sure to mention it to Tasis. And Vashk, although he’s unlikely to tell us anything about it if he has any idea what’s going on.” He gestured with a nod. “This way. I’ll be sure to give you the grand tour after, I promise. I rather want to go over the whole place again myself to see if I can find other similarities that might be important later.”
“What was it like?” Josephina asked as they crossed the foyer and began to make their way down a long set of shallow steps leading to a large door.
“Surreal,” Kelwin answered.
“It was like time stopped,” Jorget supplied. “Not even a speck of dust to be found despite how long it had been abandoned. It was weird. And kind of oppressive. I don’t recall seeing a single window, which I suppose isn’t a surprise since the thing was built inside a mountain.”
The elderly elf shuddered visibly. “No, thank you,” she said. “I’ll keep my ocean view, sea breezes, and more windows than is probably necessary.”
“And the merfolk,” Kelwin said with a grin. “I’d take them over harpies and gryphons any day.”
With that, he gave Josephina a nod, and she pushed open the door. “Go on,” she urged Jorget. “They want to meet you.”
He hesitated, and it took another encouraging nod from Kelwin before Jorget felt he could move again. He stepped through the door, and was greeted by the sight of merfolk leaping and playing in the protected waters of the large grotto. “Maker,” he whispered, slowly shuffling down the wooden dock. He found himself unable to keep his ey
es off them, and hoped he wouldn’t go tumbling into the water because he wasn’t watching where he was going.
“Triv,” Kelwin called behind him, nearly startling him out of his wits. “I have a present for you.”
“Ha!” one of the merfolk said as she swam lazily to the end of the structure. “You scared my boy to death and made him cry. Do you think a gift is going to put you back in my good graces?”
“Yeah, because everyone wants to be flung into some weird portal and knocked out for hours at a time,” Jorget said with a snort.
Triv grinned up at him as he reached the end of the dock. “Yeah, I like you. You can stay.”
“Don’t think you have much of a choice,” Jorget noted. “Hard to kick me out when you have no feet with which to do the kicking.”
“Fins are so much more useful, though,” Triv said, flipping her fin out of the water, splashing Jorget so thoroughly he could only gape at her. She merely gave him an all-too-innocent smile. “See?”
“Don’t worry, you’ll get used to it,” Kelwin told him as he set the box at his feet. “We need Vashk, Triv.”
“Is this the weapon?” she asked, hoisting herself up with her arms to get a better look at the box.
“That’s what we’re guessing,” Kelwin acknowledged. “But we think there’s a dragon inside. And it’s alive.”
Triv’s eyes went wide with horror, and she left with such speed Jorget hoped there was nothing underwater to get in her way.
Kelwin pulled off his boots and stockings before taking a seat at the edge of the dock, letting his feet dangle in the water. “You may as well sit,” he told Jorget. “Get comfortable. This conversation is probably going to take a while.”
Jorget considered the idea, then nodded and followed Kelwin’s lead. The water was ice-cold, but once the initial shock was gone it felt good. He’d been on his feet quite a bit that day, after all. He watched as Josephina got to her knees in front of the box with much more grace than he would have thought possible of someone his own age, let alone someone as old as Josephina. “There’s really a dragon in here?” she whispered softly.