by Various
After climbing down a narrow stair they came to a natural cul-de-sac. There were several large wagons there, all empty. The back door to the academy was nestled in a jagged crevice in the mountain. Hayden crept forward and tried the door, only to find it locked. It was the work of a few seconds for him to unlock it. Wary of detection, for he did not know who or what was inside the academy, Indris gestured for Hayden to wait while his arcane senses seeped through the door to trickle slowly into the empty spaces beyond. Whorls and eddies of disentropy washed against his mind, though nothing that raised an alarm. A sharp nod was all Hayden needed to open the door so they could make their way inside.
Walls, floor, and sharply arched ceiling were of dark red stone, veined with black and polished to a high sheen. Oil lanterns, scented with amber, gave the place a bloody glow. Noise drifted down long corridors. From up sweeping, shadowed stairways. Occasionally a laugh. A shout. A few times the bell of steel on steel reached their ears.
They crept from room to room. Some had surrendered to cobwebs and dust, empty weapon racks powdery with time. Rows of beds were lined against the walls of narrow cells, rope springing pallid as a sagging ribcage. Others showed signs of hasty cleaning and more recent use. Steam rooms were still warm and damp, the mortar between tiles spotted with mould. In another room heat from a recently used forge billowed over them when they opened the door, the floor rough underfoot from spilled carbon dust and metal shavings. Straight swords and shamshirs, long-knives and dagger, axes, arrowheads, and spear blades gleamed cold and new. In another room they found several ornate glass chests, lined with rotted silk. Most of them were empty, though in one were several baroque puzzle boxes. Each of the spheres, triangles, cubes, and hexagonal prisms had been opened. Indris saw the residue of ahm patterns on the puzzle boxes, old Wards for confinement and binding.
“What are they?” Mari asked.
“Dilemma Boxes,” Indris murmured. Tempted as he was to take one, such things were valuable and no doubt whoever owned them would notice if one were missing. Better if the people who inhabited the sûk had no idea anybody had broken in. “The Seethe made Dilemma Boxes to trap powerful elemental daemons, too insane to be allowed their freedom. Once trapped the daemon faced the dilemma that it could either remain imprisoned for as close to eternity as it could imagine, or accept the opened door and be bound in servitude.”
“Charming,” Shar muttered.
On several occasions they were forced to hide when roving groups of women and men strode the corridors. They were dressed as members of different castes, freeholders, merchants, and artisans, but they clearly walked like fighters and were deeply tanned from time spent under a more northerly sun. One small group in particular was led by a sallow-faced man with long greasy hair. He spoke rapidly in a nasal voice. He had a Dilemma Box in his hand, the pieces of which he moved with erratic, sharp gestures. His ostentatious over-robe was stitched with overlapping spider webs in silver thread, with silver spiders for buckles. Also amongst the group was a haughty-looking woman who rolled her eyes at the man whenever his back was turned.
“The woman is Ravenet of the Delfineh,” Mari whispered. “The daughter of the Blacksnake. The other is Nix of the Malahdi.”
“An inbred little psychopath by all accounts,” Indris said, his voice equally soft. “Your father would love him.”
“Not if memory serves, no,” Mari replied. “Father had little affection for the Family Maladhi at all. I doubt time has changed his attitude much, from some of the things I’ve heard him say in the past.”
As they trod further into the academy, Indris felt the presence of whatever watched them growing perceptively stronger, though it was still unfocussed. It felt at times as if he was being watched by somebody’s dreams.
Each room they searched showed similar signs of use, either as refurbished barracks, smithies, or storerooms for supplies of food, water, weapons, and armour. One dark stairway led down, though the stench of rot and mould caused them to move on. Indris lingered for a few seconds longer, however, certain he was being watched by something, deep in the darkness. He was about to head down when Mari returned and took him by the wrist, to join the others.
At an intersection Indris heard a commotion from a branching corridor and up a flight of stairs. He recognised the patois of dayeshi, the low-language common to merchants, people of the middle and low castes, and to professional soldiers and nahdi. The speakers were complaining about how hard it had been to store their cargo. Indris would have been happy to have moved on, were it not for the mention of how valuable it was… and the comment, “Pah-Sanojé will have us flayed alive if we damage these things.”
The conversation continued for some minutes before Hayden stiffened.
“Balls. We got company behind us,” Hayden whispered from the rear. Indris turned to see the old skirmisher raising his rifle. Omen drew his long, ornate shamshir. Indris heard the sound of booted feet approaching. The creak and jangle of leather and metal hauberks.
Indris looked to Mari who jerked her chin up the stairs to where the argument continued. Ekko grinned widely, as did Shar.
“I was hoping it wouldn’t come to a fight,” Indris murmured.
“But it has,” Mari said.
“It usually does,” Shar added blithely. She patted Indris’s cheek. “No sense in wondering could’ve, would’ve, should’ve. We’ll be quiet. Promise.”
At Indris’s nod, Mari led Ekko and Shar up the stairs in a silent lope-run. With a muffled curse Indris gestured for Omen and Hayden to follow.
Not far along the corridor at the top of the stairs was a row of ornate wooden doors. The soldiers were positioned before one of the doors on the right. The ceilings here were high, with glass panels letting in solid columns of harsh light. Ilhen lanterns on the wall shone a pale red behind tinted glass panels. Marble pillars, each capped with a brutish rusted spider, lined the walls. Rusted iron arches delicate as webs held aloft the mosaic ceiling.
Mari and the others struck in near silence.
Of the six antagonists, two fell rapidly. Mari, Shar, and Ekko engaged the remainder. Omen, stepped in, blade swinging, then stopped abruptly. Shar danced back, blundering into the Wraith Knight, who rocked on his feet but otherwise did nothing. The Seethe war chanter swore at Omen to move as she rejoined the combat. Indris barely had the time to take three steps in their direction before a series of well-placed kicks and blows with elbows, knees, and fists had felled the others. Wasting no time, Indris’s companions dragged the supine bodies through the door. Once inside, Indris closed the door behind them and turned the lock.
They waited several moments to see whether an alarm had been raised. Thankfully it had not.
“That went quite well,” Ekko rumbled. His pupils were dilated, tail sweeping the carpeted floor.
“Omen?” Shar stepped up and waved her hands in front of his leering, sharp-featured face. When there was no response she looked at Indris, before turning back to the Wraith Knight and hissing “Omen! What in the name of the winds was that?”
Rather than answer, Omen straightened himself, emerald eyes sparking in the light, and started to walk around the room with his bird-like gait. Shar watched him go, jaw set.
Inside the suite were several small crates that, when opened, revealed various powders, ointments, and potions. Others revealed weathered books, scroll cases, ink bottles, and ornate bone-handled writing brushes. A larger trunk was filled with carefully folded clothing: cloth of gold, bold silks, and heavy red gold jewellery set with polished rubies, emeralds, and sapphires.
Indris’s main interest was the largest box. Shards of light lanced down from quartz panels in the ceiling, illuminating the stray maiden’s hair of floating web threads. The bright light made the shadows even deeper. He felt a chill as he neared the box. It was Tanisian, measuring two-and-a-half metres from end to end, almost a metre-and-a-half wide, and a metre tall. Its teak surface was polished with age, carvings worn away to almost nothin
g. Indris could barely make out the vague shapes of mammoths, tigers, horned horses, and fantastical birds set amongst vines and flowers. At one point there had been characters carved around the edges of the lid, but now they were worn down to mere dents. Reliefs of rag-wrapped skeletons peered from between other carvings. Massive bronze hinges were placed down one side with a set of yellowed ivory handles on the other. He saw deep scores in the box, where it appeared chains had once been laid tight about it to keep it closed.
There was the faint sluggishness in the ahm, which spoke to old traces of salt-forged steel.
Towards the far end of the box was a crest: a circle of grinning skulls around an inlaid crown of gold and bone, held aloft by two kneeling skeletons each bearing a sickle in their free hand.
Indris’s breath caught in his throat as he stepped backward. He felt again the lick of a mind against his own, cold, dark, and dreaming.
“What’s wrong?” Mari asked as she and Shar joined him. Indris caught her by the wrist as Mari was about to touch the sarcophagus. Shar’s eyes narrowed in concern as she scanned the box more closely.
“Nobody touch this,” Indris said flatly. He started to walk around the sarcophagus, looking for something that would tell him who was inside. “I think this is the sarcophagus of one of the old rahn’s of Tanis.”
“Why would somebody bring a centuries-old dead Tanisian monarch to Avānweh?” Ekko rumbled. “And why is it so dangerous?”
“Because I suspect this rahn’s not quite as dead as it should be,” Indris muttered.
Mari cursed vehemently. Her expression held the revulsion most Avān had of Nomads.
Indris scanned the many neat rows of High Avān characters. The Tanisian dialect was not very different from Shrīanese, though there were some segments that confounded him. Finally he found what he was looking for: the centre of a knot of story and allegory about the rahn’s life and achievements.
The histories inscribed there revealed she had been the eldest daughter and heir to the last Mahjirahn of Tanis before the Insurrection. A fallen Nilvedic Scholar, a witch and necromancer. According to legend she was one of those who had willingly become a Nomad to extend an already long, cruel and malignant life. A heretic among a people who worshipped their Ancestors, she achieved immortality by becoming a lich: locking her soul in a Wraithjar while she animated the mouldering flesh and bones of her own dead body. She had been succeeded down the centuries by the dissolute and corrupt living members of her line, including Chepherundi op Sanojé, a known ally of Jhem. Legend had it the heirs of the Great House of Chepherundi would marry, produce offspring to maintain the family line, then if they had the power would follow in the footstep of their forebears. A family whose entire legacy was to defy one of the Avān’s most central beliefs in allowing the dead the peace of the Well of Souls.
The once casual scrutiny Indris sensed with the ahmsah became sharper. He moved cautiously away from the sarcophagus, eyeing it with trepidation.
Omen stalked to the side of the sarcophagus, head cocked to one side as if listening. “She lingers on the edge of slumber, teetering to mayhap tumble to the numbness of rest or the gleeful evil which is her wont.”
“She? You can hear…” Mari’s mouth curled downwards in distaste. She backed away from Omen, her eyes on Indris. “Indris, what in the name of the hallowed Ancestors is in this cursed box?”
“Her name is Mahjirahn Chepherundi op Kumeri,” Omen hummed. “A lich. There is in her a great decay, a longing and hunger for greater days. She has bound herself in history, hoping for final victory against all the wrongs she perceives have been done against her and revenge long overdue.”
“Easily sorted.” Ekko strode forward, hands extended to open the sarcophagus.
“No!” Indris snapped as he swatted Ekko’s hands away.
“It needs to be destroyed,” Mari said, steel in her tone.
“If what I’ve read about the few known liches is right,” Indris warned, “this thing is protected by layers of arcane traps. If I manage to get past those without getting either myself or any of you killed, there’s still the lich to face. Do you have even the most remote idea of the mind and force of will it takes for a mystic to do this to themselves?”
“You can destroy this thing!” Mari’s belief was as much about trusting Indris as it was about needing the lich destroyed, and her eyes were wide with dread.
“Possibly—”
“You lifted a cursed ship and all its passengers, then flew it for hours across the Rōmarq,” Mari urged. “This should be nothing.”
“Lots of things should be easier than they are,” Indris held her gaze. “But wishing doesn’t make them so.”
“We remove monstrosities like Nomads from the world.” Hayden’s moustache bristled. “We don’t walk away from them. No offence, Omen.”
“None taken.” Omen tapped his onyx-nailed fingers together in a rapid tattoo. He turned his head from side to side, as if looking for the best place to attack the sarcophagus.
Hayden ran his thumb over the stock of his storm-rifle. “I conjure if we just destroy the box—”
“Hayden,” Shar said, “haven’t you listened to a damned word Indris said?”
“Hayden’s got the right idea.” Mari’s expression had become intent as she stared at the sarcophagus. Her long-fingered hand was curled around the hilt of her amenesqa. “We must end this thing.”
“Would you all just shut up for a minute?” Indris opened the ahmsah a little wider, then wider still, to take in the complex system of arcane analogues and metaphors Kumeri had woven about her sarcophagus. It was complex and subtle work on her part. The entire surface was crisscrossed with an irregular hair-fine tracery of disentropic filaments. Elemental totems had been made at the junctures of the strands, intricate knots of primal disentropy. To his heightened senses the sarcophagus was blistered with rapidly blinking, bloodshot mystic eyes that rolled in weeping orbits. Many of those eyes scanned his friends, though more of them stared suspiciously at Indris. Slack-lipped mouths opened and closed, streamers of flesh like gaol bars between the rubbery lips stretching with each idiot gesture. An intricate web of disentropy fanned out from the sarcophagus, lines of barely visible energy so subtle Indris could not fathom their purpose from their lack of colour or texture.
All of it gave him the oiliness of the soul he had come to associate with the Drear.
He flexed his aura and formed a gentle disentropic probe, lighter and gentler than a baby’s breath. It stretched out, its tether becoming thinner until it snapped, leaving a shimmering blue orb the size of a pea. He manipulated it closer to the sarcophagus. Ever so softly he urged his disentropic bead closer, then relinquished control. It spasmed, a diaphanous droplet trembling in midair, before it started to slowly fall. As it dropped, the disentropic orb lost its imprint of Indris’s soul, becoming neutral energy, as harmless as disentropy could be.
It touched the arcane net, which bound the sarcophagus.
The room was lit by a brilliant flash of ball lightning where the tiny bead of disentropy had landed. Smoke coiled from the spot. The air reeked of electrical storms and scorched air. Indris heard his companions swear, weapons hissing from sheaths.
With his senses still finely tuned Indris saw the disentropic web begin to flex. Their colours brightened. Elemental totems flared with gem-like brilliance. After several heartbeats the arcane defences settled back to normal except for the web of strands that spread out into the wider world. These flared with diamond light, pulses shooting outward like they were driven by a beating heart. It looked a lot like a mystic alarm going off.
Indris swore under his breath.
“What happened?” Shar asked.
“Time’s up,” he said to his friends. “Run for it and don’t stop. We’ll meet back at the Iron Dog an hour from now.”
“So, situation normal then,” Shar said cheerfully. Indris went with them as far as the door.
“What are you doing?�
�� Mari asked over her shoulder as the others dashed for the stairs, weapons drawn.
“You all wanted it destroyed,” Indris said grimly, “so I’m going to do what I can. Liches are nothing to mess with.”
“You said you couldn’t,” she accused.
“I said I possibly could.” Indris shrugged. “But I don’t need to destroy it. I need for its defences to make enough of a disturbance in the ahm so the Sēq will sense it. They’ll waste no time getting here, trust me. Then they can destroy it.”
“What about you?”
“I’ll be safer if I’m the only person I need to worry about.” He took her head in both his hands and kissed her deeply. They waited for a few heartbeats, gazes locked, foreheads pressed against each other. “Please, Mari. Go. I’ll meet up with you later.”
“Promise?” she whispered.
Indris smiled in response. She nodded quickly then turned on her heel and sprinted after the others.
Facing the room, Indris opened more of himself to the ahmsah. Changeling crooned in her sheath. She trembled against his back. The disentropic wards and protections woven about the sarcophagus were incandescent. The mystic eyes rolled in his direction and the hundreds of rubbery mouths started chanting in discordant, atonal voices. Kumeri’s defences detected Indris as he revealed his power.
Numbers and symbols danced through Indris’s mind as he crooned defensive wards. Arcs of lightning crashed against the fractals of energy that circled about him. Fire blossomed around his feet and rained from above, only to be quenched by tumbling diamonds of blue white power.
For good measure he manifested a coiled spring of pure disentropy between his hands, then hurled it against the sarcophagus. Sheets of light and power flared, almost blinding him. When the light subsided the lid of the sarcophagus had been blown to splinters. Indris caught a brief glimpse of the ragged skeleton as it rose from its bed.