by R. R. Banks
They all walked toward the prison, going at an angle so that they walked around the perimeter.
"Wait," Pyra said suddenly, "What's that?"
Bannack followed the direction where he was pointing. He saw that the several rainstorms that had occurred over the weeks since their battle with the Klimnu had washed away enough of the ashes to reveal what looked like the edges of a trapdoor in the foundation. Pyra climbed into the remnants of the prison and toward the trapdoor. Bannack followed, watching carefully where he stepped to avoid stepping on something that might injure him if it suddenly gave way, broke, or splintered upwards.
By the time he had gotten to the edge of the trapdoor, Pyra was already on his knees digging with his fingers around the edge.
"Help me," he grunted.
Bannack reached forward to pull on the edge of the door. The heat from the fire seemed to have melted some of the metal, but after a few minutes of pulling, the weakened door broke and the two warriors were able to toss the pieces of door away. They stared down into what looked like a black abyss. It was so dark that they couldn't see the ground and there was no way of determining how far the fall would be between the door and the floor.
"Does anyone have a light?" Pyra asked.
Ty reached into his bag and withdrew a stick loaded with a solar power cell. Bannack took it and activated it so that it sent a wash of light down into the hole. Even with the light there wasn’t anything to see. Pyra took his bag off of his shoulders and handed it to Bannack, then jumped down through the trapdoor.
"What the hell do you think you're doing?" Ero yelled, dropping to his knees beside the open trapdoor and staring down into the darkness.
Bannack swept the light back and forth until it fell on Pyra, crouched on a dark stone floor at least twenty feet down.
"It's a trapdoor," Pyra said, "It had to be close enough to the floor to let people actually get down here. Come on. Jump down."
Bannack went first, followed close by Ero. They stepped out of the way so that most of the other warriors could follow. A few had pulled out their own lights and soon there was enough illumination that they were able to see they were in some kind of dungeon.
"Well, it was close enough that we could get down, but that doesn't make any sense for the Klimnu. They're not anywhere near as big as we are. How would they get down here without breaking themselves?"
Pyra gazed up at the open trapdoor like he was pondering what Ty had just asked.
"I'm not sure. Anyway, let's look around. I didn't even know this place was here when we were here."
The group split off so that they could explore the dungeon more efficiently, breaking up so that everyone had a light with them. They had been exploring the dark, damp hallways for nearly an hour when Ty discovered a door on an otherwise blank wall. Unlike the other doors that looked like they had once belonged to cells, this door was solid. He stepped back and directed a hard kick into the middle of the door, causing it to splinter.
Pushing aside the broken pieces of door, Ty stepped inside the small room and shined his light around. It looked like an office; a large desk on one wall, rows of bookshelves on another, and the back corner filled with what looked like stacks of drawers. Ty approached the drawers cautiously and pulled one open. It was filled with folders of documents and he pulled several out so that he could spread them across the surface of the desk.
"Hey, Pyra," he yelled a few minutes later after going through a few pages of the documents he had found in the folders.
Pyra stepped into the room and shined the light he had borrowed from another warrior after giving Ty back his on the desk.
"What did you find?"
"What do you know about this prison?" Ty asked, flipping through the fragile, aged pages of a book that looked ancient in his hands.
"Not much. I didn't even know it was here until the Klimnu attacked. I'm guessing that they built it so long ago that no one remembers it."
"I don't think they built it at all."
"What do you mean?"
"Look at this."
Pyra came around the side of the desk and Ty turned the book to show him what he was reading.
"Holy shit."
"I know."
"What's going on?" Ero asked, coming into the small room.
"This prison wasn't built by the Klimnu," Pyra told him.
"What do you mean?"
"Ty just found all of these books and papers. It looks like the Klimnu were just about as gracious with this prison as they were with the realm under the compound. Apparently this prison has been here for hundreds of years, which means that it was built before the Denynso were living on the compound."
"How could we not know that?"
"I don't know. Creia said that our kind has never made contact with other species except in battle. If it was there when the Denynso settled the compound, they either didn't notice it, or the species that built it was already gone by the time they came."
"How is that even possible?" Ero asked.
"I don't know."
"Look at this."
Pyra had pulled another, smaller book out from the stack of papers that Ty had taken out of the drawer and held it open to the other warriors. It looked almost like a military log, but was more extensive, like the person keeping it was both tracking the events and journaling about them as his way to express his thoughts and emotions.
"This says that the species that built this prison built it during a war with another species that they had been in conflict with for years. They used this prison to hold people who they captured during battle, but the other species found out and infiltrated the prison, freeing all of the captives and killing many of the Covra."
"The Covra?"
"That's what it says. I've never heard of that species before."
"What happened after that battle?"
"This says that the Covra knew that they weren't strong enough to fight off the rest of what they call the Light Ones, so they locked them."
Pyra stopped and looked up at the other men, a confused look on his face.
"Locked them?" Ty asked.
Pyra turned the page and read for a few seconds before looking up at them again.
"It says that the Covra can lock an entire area in place. It's like the whole place is frozen in time. They at once exist and don't. Time passes around them, but it doesn't impact them. They locked the entire kingdom of the Light Ones in that moment and never made any plans to release them."
Pyra met eyes with Ty, and then with Ero.
"What if they're still there?"
Chapter Nine
"What do you mean?" Ero asked.
"There's a map right here that shows where everything was when this all happened." He pointed at a large area outlined toward the upper corner of the map. "What if the kingdom is still there and the Light Ones are still stuck there, just like they have been since the Covra locked them?"
Silence fell in the room as the three men pondered what Pyra had just said. It was almost unfathomable that what that journal said could be true. After what they had all seen Loralia achieve with her mirrors, they were far more willing to accept that there were things that existed right on their own planet that they didn't understand, and species that could accomplish truly astounding things. The idea that one of these creatures could literally stop time for an entire other species, and that that frozen kingdom could still be persisting in its fully locked state just as it had been for years was too much for any of them to wrap their minds around.
"Pyra?"
The voice of another of the warriors made them all turn to the door to the office. Lynx stood there, leaning into the room with the glow from the light in his hand directed at the floor.
"What is it, Lynx?" Pyra asked.
There really isn't much down here. A bunch of cells. A couple of old chains."
"Tell the men to find a way to get back up out of the trapdoor and gather up outside. Our little adventure here is taking a
detour."
"Where are we going?"
"Back in time, it looks like."
Twenty minutes later the men had managed to find a nearly rusted-out metal ladder that looked like it was once attached to the bottom of the trapdoor so it could be used to climb in and out of the dungeon and had gathered right outside in the soft rain. Though the fact that the Klimnu had not actually built the prison originally explained why the structure was built as it was, the existence of the ladder seemed to make the dungeon make more sense.
Pyra gave them a brief overview of what they had found out in the office in the dungeon and told them that they were going to follow that map and see what they could find in the place that marked where the kingdom of the Light Ones at least once stood. Lynx watched him push the stack of papers and books he had carried out of the dungeon into the bag that he had returned to his hip and headed out toward the furthest boundary of the compound, past the wastelands and toward the complete unknown.
The rain intensified as they walked, starting to beat down on them in stinging streams that hurt as they bit into Lynx's exposed skin. It was that fearsome type of rain that made you want to stay inside, drink something hot, and wait until it was over. The men didn't have that option, now. They had committed themselves to this mission, and now it seemed to be taking on even more meaning that it had when they had first started. When he first agreed to go along with them to explore Uoria, Lynx never would have imagined that they would be gone from their homes for only a few hours and already have learned of two species that they didn't know existed up until that point, but also a whole history of the planet and their own compound that none of them had known.
Though he hated himself for thinking it, and wouldn't ever have admitted it in those first few hours, Lynx was starting to change his perception of Creia. Like the other warriors, he had been raised believing that this man was the most powerful and wise of all of the Denynso. Part of a bloodline known for their extraordinary longevity, he had ruled for many decades and had faced many of the earliest battles and conflicts in the ranks of the warriors. It had been Creia who had shown the strength and courage to banish the Klimnu because of their greedy, vicious ways rather than letting them intimidate him into helping them. With all of this history and knowledge, however, he somehow hadn't known about the mirrored realm that existed just beneath the compound he had called home his entire life, or about the prison in the wastelands.
At least, he told them that he didn't know. The longer that they walked, the more footsteps that they put between the area of the compound that they knew and themselves, the more Lynx wondered how honest Creia had really been with them. Was it possible that he had known about the prison and the apparently brutal, drawn-out conflict that had existed there so long ago? Had he been completely honest with them when he told them that their kind had not made contact with others outside of the battles waged on the soil of their own compound?
Lynx felt painfully guilty for even entertaining those thoughts for a second. As a Denynso warrior, it was his responsibility and birthright to honor, respect, and obey Creia without question. He was meant to follow him and do as he ordered no matter what. The thought of questioning him for even a second would be something that the other warriors, or the king himself, would never have tolerated.
The young warrior was so lost in his own thoughts that he didn't notice the rest of the warriors had stopped and he ran directly into Gyyx's back. The larger, older warriors turned and glared at him, but turned back to face ahead of him without saying anything. Lynx stepped around to stand beside Gyyx and looked to where Pyra was standing several feet in front of the rest of them. A tall wall of weathered, ancient rocks stood just in front of him. It was the far boundary of the Denynso compound, laid by the very hands of the first of the clan. They had built in there to protect all who lived within it, intending, as the warriors had all been taught from the time that they were little children, that none would ever come inside the boundary to take the compound from them, no species not welcomed by the Denynso would come within the space without quick and brutal retribution, and that none of their kind would ever step beyond it.
They were prepared now to break free of those restraints; to be the first to go past the boundary and take back the freedom of existence on the entirety of the planet of Uoria.
Chapter Ten
"This is your last chance, men," Pyra said, his voice rumbling through the silence that had formed around them, "Once we go over this wall, we are out of the compound and facing things that none of us know or understand. There will be no turning back. If you aren't ready to do this, tell us now and you can go back. Think very hard about your decision, because it is one of the most important that you will ever make."
Pyra's glowing orange eyes burned into each of the men, giving them time to think about the implications of moving beyond that boundary and walking out onto the rest of the planet. Though they were feared throughout the galaxy, each of them was very aware that the compound had protected them, had guarded them. When they went beyond that wall, there was nothing left to surround them and keep them safe. Of course, that wall had also failed them when it came to keeping the Klimnu from attacking and tormenting them. It hadn't been enough to prevent the betrayal of the traitor Ullie, and it hadn't guarded them from the work of the flight attendant who had cooperated with him and the slimy, disgusting Klimnu to nearly spell the end of the Denynso.
Lynx could feel that the rest of the warriors around him felt the same way. They could no longer put their total blind trust and confidence in that wall. It was time that they took responsibility for themselves.
When none of the men told him that they wanted to turn back, Pyra nodded at them, his face not smiling but carrying an expression that offered a hint of strength and pride. He tilted his head back to evaluate the wall and then reached onto the side of his bag to untie a grappling hook. The other men followed suit, taking their hooks from their bags and preparing the ropes. A few moments later the Denynso stood in a long line in front of the wall.
At Pyra's command, they swung their hooks over the top of the wall and waited until they felt them catch in the stones on the other side. Moving in the perfect, nearly choreographed rhythm they had trained into their ranks, the men used the pressure of the hooks and the strength of the ropes to steady them as they climbed up the wall.
Lynx stopped when he reached the top of the wall and gazed out over the land that lay on the other side. It looked much like the far areas of the compound where there were no buildings or roads, but somehow despite its similarities, it still seemed sparser and unwelcoming.
Not wanting to be the last to be off the wall, Lynx dropped down on the other side of the wall and went through the same procedure as all of the other men, recoiling their hooks and attaching them back to their bags for use the next time that they may need them. Pyra didn't say another word, but waited until all of the men had come over the wall, and then started further along the open field. Lynx could see his gaze focused intensely on the stands of trees that dotted the field and the tall, coarse grass to either side of them. It was as though their leader were on edge with every footstep, just waiting for something to come out at them.
Pyra consulted the map in the book in his hand every few minutes, occasionally calling back to the rest of the men about which direction they needed to go, or about how far he thought it would be. Lynx followed silently, preferring to keep himself vigilant about what may be lurking at any corner rather than responding when any of the men spoke.
They had been walking for what felt like hours when Pyra suddenly slowed and all of the men followed his gaze to a towering, ivy-covered stone archway a few yards ahead of them. A worn, crumbling stone wall very similar to the one that they had crossed to leave the compound but older and of darker-colored rocks stretched out to either side of the archway and Lynx could see that it, too, had been taken over by the plants of the area that seemed to be trying to reclaim that space.
"This is it," Pyra said almost under his breath, "I can't believe it's actually here."
The men stood in stunned silence for several long seconds, not entirely sure of what they should do from there. They had come this far looking for the kingdom to see if it actually existed, and now that they had found that it did, and that it was still there, they didn't know what to do next.
"Are we going inside?" Ero asked.
Lynx watched Pyra nod.
"The only way to find out if all of this about the Covra and the Light Ones is real is to go in there and see if we find a kingdom that has been locked in time."
"How do we know that if it is all real, that we will be able to go in there at all, or that if we can, that we won't get locked too?" Ty asked.
"We don't," Pyra responded simply, "We don't know any of that. We can't just walk away from it, though. The whole point of us leaving the compound was to find out what else existed on this planet. Well, this is what else exists here. We can't stop now. We have to keep going and find out exactly what happened in there, and what is still happening, whether that means that all of the stuff in these books was just a bunch of made-up stories and that is an abandoned archway to an empty kingdom that no one has lived in for centuries, or that it is all absolutely true and waiting right inside there is an entire species that hasn't changed in longer than any of us have been alive."
"What if something does happen to us, though?" asked one of the warriors from the back of the group, "What about Eden and the baby?"
Pyra's eyes flashed at the mention of his mate and their unborn child and Lynx saw his back straighten and his shoulders square forcefully.
"My mate trusts me. She put her faith in me to find out more about Uoria so that I will be able to protect her and our baby well into the future. As for the baby, my child will know that I didn't stop at anything to make sure that my family was safe, and that I never cowered away from a challenge or a risk. I never want to look my baby in the eye and know that I didn't do absolutely everything that I could to complete my goal out here."