by Jim Galford
Estin agreed with her, as did Turess. Estin walked to the door of the room and pressed his ear to it. He could hear faint sounds in the distance, though they were too far off to be sure if they were voices or echoes of the fighting outside the temple. While he was listening, Feanne went to the window and snuffled loudly, clearly trying to get a better idea of where they were and what was around them.
“How far to the ward?” Estin asked without taking his ear from the door. “I can hear a patrol out there, so we’re stuck here for a minute or two.”
Turess shook his head. “Only a flight of stairs and few minutes’ walk. I know my brother, though. He will have guards, and they will be ones he trusts. None of the stairs will be usable with only three of us to clear them. If he has limited troops, most will be outside and rest will be where he expects us to go.”
“Then find us another way. You know this place better than we do.”
Frowning and rubbing at his tattoos, Turess thought a moment. “Without being able to scale walls of temple interior, there is no other good way than through the main floor by way of stairs.”
Feanne smirked at Estin knowingly.
“Assuming we had a climber?” Estin asked, leaving the door.
Turess watched him for a moment before grinning and nodding. “I am sorry. I forgot myself. Your breed always was one for climbing things, both practical and impractical. Once, I would have checked the ceiling for spies that looked like you.”
Estin’s heart skipped a beat as he remembered Turess knew what he was. There was little time left for that conversation. “You told me a while back that you didn’t need to tell me who I am. I think it’s time. I want to die knowing who my people are…were. It’s not because I need an identity. I just want to know for the sake of knowing.”
“Of course,” Turess said, his brows crinkling. “Is little reason to let it die with me.” Turess rubbed his stubbled chin and looked to Feanne before answering. “I do not have the word in your language, and even if I did, a word is not a person, as I have told you before. My word is not who you are. Another would call your kind something else.”
“Anything,” Estin begged. “Give me a word in any language for what I am. I don’t even remember my parents beyond fleeting memories. Please, give me something before we do this. I’d rather we go into this knowing who and what I am. I need it to feel complete, in case…” As Estin trailed off, Feanne came over and touched his arm gently.
Turess thought a moment. “Please do not take this wrong way, but I hesitate to say it only because I fear it gives you hope of finding more of your kind when this is done. I do not wish to instill hope where it may not have a place. Your breed was rare even in my day. I only met the one, myself.”
“Please, Turess. I’ve spent my life wondering. We don’t have long.”
“I will give you what I can,” Turess replied, leaning against the wall. “Those like you I have known were summer or southern folk. They lived in the trees, eating insects and fruit whenever possible. They were loyal, loving people who prized family, community, and their kin above all else. They made foolhardy decisions—”
Laughing, Feanne said, “That would be him, yes. Two thousand years and his breed hasn’t changed.”
“—while keeping their heart on their loved ones,” Turess finished, giving Feanne a glare. “I could trust all of them with any goal that would aid their families, though I would never have trusted any of them in a game of chance or when they were bored. We considered them some of the best-hearted among us. I do not even have their name in my own language. The only tongue I have ever heard used for your breed was from the far south, where they were called ‘lemur.’ What it means, I do not know. That is the only word I can offer you, Estin. Lacking anything else, it is what you are, though you are so much more.”
Closing his eyes and letting out a sigh of relief, Estin nodded and smiled. Such a small thing, and yet so fulfilling to finally have a name for what he was. He had spent his life hearing others called “fox” or “wolf,” while only knowing himself as “ring-tailed wildling.” It gave him a sense of self that he felt he had lost with the death of his own family as a child.
“Thank you,” he told Turess, as he turned back to the door. “Shy of my mate and children, that may be the greatest gift anyone has ever given me.”
From the corner of his eye, he saw Feanne touch Turess’s shoulder and mouth “Thank you,” but he chose to ignore it. He had already stalled them longer than he would have liked.
“The hall’s clear,” Estin said, pulling the door open a crack to be sure. In both directions, the stone hallway remained dark and empty. “If we’re going to get to the wards and do something to help, we should do it soon. I don’t want Linn getting butchered while we dawdle.”
“Estin, what we do here will not save those outside the temple,” Turess said, coming up alongside the door. “You will need to clarify magic on the wards. I have seen you use magic and know you will be able to make out how I have built the wards when you see it. You do not need to know how I made it in first place. Use yours to smooth the edges, and it will hold that much better. This will push back the mists and hold them a little longer while also making them destroy everything at edge of the barrier as they fight to get in. It gives us time to trap my brother and learn what he knows. When mists break through, they will rush for the center of the temple. Those outside may be able to escape during the destruction…I do not know if we can. We do this to give time for Linn to strike at Dorralt. It will not help us defeat him by itself.”
“I understand,” he said, keeping his eyes on the hall.
“Good. No false hopes today, yes? I will tell you how to get there. We will go a different way and draw attention away from you. Once you begin working on the warding, Dorralt will come for you. There is nothing I can do about that. He will feel the changes and will know someone has slipped past. If he is smart, he will wait to attack you until you finish, so he has the added protection for himself without using his own magic. Once you finish…he will use everything he has to kill you out of hatred of what you are.”
Estin nodded and closed the door. When he looked up, he saw the subtle ear, whisker, and tail posturing Feanne was trying to hide. He knew the look all too well from when they had lost Atall and she had fought to control her fears. Knowing exactly what she was thinking, he hurriedly went to her, pulling her into a tight hug.
“This isn’t the end,” he whispered at her ear. “Don’t even think that. Don’t say good-bye.”
Feanne nodded into his shoulder, digging her claws into his back to hold him as tightly to her as she could manage without hurting him. “I will come for you, with or without half the Turessian army chasing me. We will be together at the end. I swear that to you. We will not die apart. When we finally run out of chances, we will die in each other’s arms.”
“We were hurrying?” Turess asked, stepping out into the hall and looking both directions. “Normally, I would encourage you two, but right now I think we need to get this done. Estin, up the hall that way, climb first pillar, and you will see the warding. You will need to get close to it to change anything. We will go the other way and circle back.”
Estin nuzzled Feanne’s cheek, and she did the same in return before pushing him away and joining Turess in the hall. They ran off, leaving Estin alone in the fortresslike temple. Almost immediately the stone walls seemed to become oppressive, making him wonder if he really wanted to stay. He pushed down the feeling, realizing it was somehow an extension of the magic in use there, making his skin crawl.
“Fix the ancient magic through guesswork and kill the godlike leader of the unkillable Turessians,” Estin whispered to himself as he padded into the hallway, bringing his paws down gently to keep from making any noise. Every few steps, he checked over his shoulder for Turess and Feanne, but the halls were dark in both directions. Wherever they had gone, they were doing a fine job of sneaking. “I’ve probably had worse plans.�
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Keeping close to the wall, Estin crept in the direction Turess had told him to go. Every so often, his keen vision picked out faded paintings on the walls despite the dim light, though he mostly ignored them. His attention was held much more easily by the eerie way that shadows hung to the stones, giving the hall the appearance of a massive ribcage…finally explaining why Turess had made the place sound as morbid as he had.
Twice along the way, a click on the stone somewhere ahead made him stop and ready himself for an attack that did not come. He had been in enough crypts to know it was likely just the stones settling, but given where he was, he was not about to be careless. Everything in the temple probably wanted him dead.
Estin continued another hundred feet or so, following the curve of the hall, realizing it likely circled the whole temple. He had no idea how big the place was, but the gentle curve suggested it was huge, and the fact that he had not walked into Feanne and Turess yet confirmed it. Every dozen feet, a door or archway broke the otherwise smooth walls, forcing him to stop and check for anyone who would try to attack him. He passed four such doors and one archway before he came to an occupied room. While he could not hear the occupants, he did smell them well before reaching the room. Humans, from what he could tell, along with the scent of fresh blood.
Inching up to the archway, Estin sniffed quietly again, picking up the scent of at least three humans, sweat, and plenty of blood. Hushed voices beyond spoke in deeply accented Turessian, though he managed to pick up the words for armies and insanity. There were so few words he had learned from Yoska and Turess’s discussions that he was surprised he understood any of what he heard.
Estin shifted to the very edge of the archway and glanced inside as quickly as he could, hoping he would not be seen. Thankfully, the two black-robed Turessians standing in the small room were focused on a third man’s wounds as he lay on the floor. From what Estin saw in that quick glimpse, the man was in bad shape, and the other two were looking little better. He caught sight of horrible burns and smiled to himself, realizing they had likely faced the dragon outside. They were trying to heal the wounded man…
Living Turessians, he realized with a bit of surprise. He had not really considered that some of the Turessian people would openly back Dorralt, but it made sense. A clan or more would be nearby, not just three people. That meant he had to worry about undead, Turessians controlled by Dorralt, and actual living, breathing Turessians. At least these and the undead he could smell before they reached him.
The tap of boots on the stone floor behind him startled Estin, and he nearly stepped into the doorway out of reflex as he shifted. He looked around frantically for any deep shadows or nooks that might be large enough to fit him. Just past the room with the wounded Turessians, the ceiling climbed toward several windows that helped light the hallway, creating an area where he could easily fit, so long as no one looked up. Unfortunately, it would put him in the way of the light, making it likely that his shadow would be seen if he moved at all.
Digging his claws between the fitted stones—though his feet seemed to skitter off far more loudly than he would have liked—Estin scrambled up to the high ceiling as the boots came closer. When he reached top, he was forced to slow his pace and carefully find firm grips so he could hold himself up as he turned upside-down and inched along the ceiling, keeping his tail as flat as he could to the stones. The footfalls continued their approach even as he yanked himself into the lighted stone shaft and flattened out against the side wall. His fingers and toes shook with the effort of maintaining his weight. As an afterthought, he yanked his tail up into the small opening. He pressed it against the stones to keep it from slipping and to minimize the need to pay attention to it. He had enough to worry about just trying not to fall.
Below him, two Turessians came up to the entrance of the room and stopped directly under Estin. They looked into the room where the others were healing their ally, shaking their heads as they laughed. Estin wondered at that briefly before realizing he could not smell the newcomers.
“Weaklings,” muttered one of the men beneath Estin. “We should have killed them all. They would have served better as corpses.”
Estin’s arms trembled. He looked up at the light shaft, hoping there was something he could grab hold of. There was nothing within reach, forcing him to remain still with all of his weight on his wrists and ankles. He could not even brace himself properly against the shaft’s sides without blocking the light from the window. Another minute or two would be about all he could manage before falling unless he could change his position. Already the tips of his fingers were numb, making his grip unsteady. His left leg was throbbing painfully, the recently healed bones reminding him how bad of an idea the climb had been.
The three wounded men shouted something back at the Turessians in the hall, who laughed and walked away. To Estin it sounded as though the living men had made some form of crude remark to insult the undead. The tone simply sounded familiar from too many years in the bad sections of Altis.
Slowly, Estin adjusted his grip to ensure he would not fall or tire his arms too quickly, now that the Turessians were outside the light cast by the tunnel he hung from. He was halfway through changing position, with one leg on one wall, bracing himself with his hands on the other, when the Turessians came back, forcing him to freeze. Looking down, he could see his shadow cast across the top of their hoods. If they glanced up at the window, he was as good as dead. If they looked at the floor, there was a very distinct wildling-shaped shadow.
The Turessians motioned toward the room. Screams and the smell of burning flesh rose toward the window above him. The men walked away without looking up, and the nauseating scent continued to drift past Estin. Soon, a steady stream of smoke rose up and out of the temple through the window.
Once he was sure the Turessians were too far away to see his shadow move, Estin crawled down the wall until he could poke his head out from the window’s shaft. Looking both directions, he saw nothing and dropped to the floor in a squat. He waited for a shout from anyone he had missed that might be standing ready to attack him. When no shouts came, he stood and went into the room. The three Turessian men lay crumpled on the floor, their robes steaming and bloody burns marking where magic had struck them. They all stared lifelessly at the ceiling.
“Sorry about this,” Estin told the corpse of the nearest man. He dragged the body out of the way of the door and settled it behind the lip of the wall, where it would not be seen by anyone passing by. He scanned the body quickly, looking for anything that might help him, and then realized that aside from the small burns on the chest, the man’s robe was mostly intact.
Disgusted by his own desperation, Estin pulled the man out of his robe and threw it over his own shoulders. He tried not to pay too much attention to the stench of death and the bloody hole in the middle of his chest. Thankfully, his own dark shirt helped conceal the hole somewhat.
Estin examined himself as he belted his swords on over the robe. He had seen Turessians use weapons, so that was not much of a concern. His massive tail would be far more likely to give him away. Even with the hood pulled up, his muzzle and ears were impossible to hide. At best he might not be noticed by someone who was paying attention elsewhere. It might allow him to get a little closer to the runes Turess wanted him to fix, but it would certainly not let him walk past a Turessian without being caught.
As he was contemplating abandoning the robe entirely, another Turessian walked past the door of the room. The woman glanced Estin’s direction and kept walking, her gaze on the ground once she was past. She shook her head, likely thinking Estin was the reason for the two corpses still visible from the door. Sniffing, he easily picked up the woman’s scent. Given that she had hurried away, Estin took it to mean the living and dead Turessians were at the verge of open warfare within the temple. What he had witnessed was not isolated.
Satisfied he had not defiled a body for no good reason, Estin went back into the hall
once the Turessian had gone. He continued in the direction he had been going and found the right-hand side opened into a sunlit courtyard, with pillars that acted as tall doorways from the inner halls. Within that courtyard, several dozen robed figures were gathered, talking amongst themselves. In the distance, rumbles and screams came from somewhere outside. The odd acoustics made it feel as though they were miles away, but Estin knew they had to be far closer, unless the Turessians had managed to push back the dragons.
Estin ducked back into the shadows and more carefully approached the opening into the courtyard, trying to get a better idea of what he was dealing with. The pillars actually went up far above the top of the hallway where he stood, with a thirty-foot gap between the roof of the outer section of the temple and the top of the pillars, where Estin could see the sky beyond—though that was entirely shrouded by mists. At the top, a stone ring had been built that connected the pillars, with smaller pillars atop it, allowing for another twenty feet of daylight between them. Atop that, a stone dome capped the temple. From what he could see, the ring of rooms he had passed through was the only actual enclosed space. The only viable way up the pillars for most people was a single narrow staircase carved into one of the pillars, which began near the group of Turessians. Everything else opened into the courtyard, which was easily large enough for a hundred people to stand inside comfortably.
A flash of light near the top of the pillars caught Estin’s eye, and he saw runes were etched into the stone ring halfway up, with another row along the dome’s bottom. All of the runes flickered in the same way those in the temple in Jnodin had when the mists had come. They were sparking and burning out as the mists ripped their power from them. Just as the runes in Jnodin had, these made Estin’s skin prickle painfully, making him feel as though the magic were tugging at his fur. For that he could probably thank Mairlee, if he ever saw her again. Whatever she had done made him far more sensitive to the runes’ effects than he likely should have been.