Mattle’s face took on a distant look and he almost tripped over several roots as they walked. Selth looked at him worriedly but held her tongue, she didn’t want to do anything that might disrupt his concentration. Finally he answered, “Raxous says that the mountain wolves are ancient cousins to his species. Creatures from an age long past which had to fight to survive in a much more brutal world than the one we live in.”
Her eyebrows shot up in surprise. “You were talking with,” she flicked her eyes back to where Raxous trailed along behind the two of them, tongue lolling out of his mouth around oversized teeth.
“Is that an issue?” Mattle asked, his eyes narrowing dangerously.
“Not at all,” she said, “I suppose I still hadn’t connected Raxous with an intelligent creature capable of carrying on conversation.”
Raxous let out a small growl and Mattle laughed, “He’s not very happy with you. Doesn’t appreciate the fact that he just gave you information and you repaid it by spitting in his face, so to speak. But the mountain wolves are massive, they live in the Mountains of Endless Night because everywhere else they were hunted to extinction by magi of the academy. They’re vicious and will attack anything that moves. Horses would have drawn them like flies to honey; as we are we may not sneak past unnoticed.”
Selth’s blood turned to ice and she turned her head to gaze into the indomitable wall of darkness ahead, the mountains were looking more and more like a place she wished she had never decided to come to. This adventure had proven to be one painful experience after another, it would have been far more comfortable to stay at the academy or in Redtower, passing the time thieving and practicing her magic. Mattle seemed to be lost in his own thoughts and the two of them walked on in silence. Even Kant gave up questioning Aren.
Suddenly, Aren stopped walking and Selth, Kant, and Mattle almost collided with the old mage’s back. She started to voice an angry complaint but she silenced herself when she realized why he had stopped. The sky had been getting progressively darker throughout the day and where they were standing everything was shrouded in a dark gray. But in front of Aren was a wall of deeper darkness, a darkness more terrifying than the blackest night. Tentacles of the stuff reached out towards the four of them, wafting around and through Selth and the others, as though trying to pull them into the mountains. “Welcome,” Aren said in a resonating voice, eyes flashing darkly and a dangerous look forming on his face, “To the Mountains of Endless Night.” With a swirl of his cape he strode forward into the wall of darkness. It parted before him then as his cloak passed the boundary of darkness it rebounded, swallowing him up completely. Selth and the others looked at each other in shock then hurried after him. No one wanted to be lost in or near the mountains without the mage to show them what to do and where to go.
Kant and Mattle nearly collided with each other as soon as they stepped into the mountains, weighed down by an impenetrable darkness which captured everything within it, but Selth felt alive, alive as she hadn’t been since the chains were put on her wrists. Looking down, she saw strands of darkness wrapped around her chains, twisting and turning, trying to find weaknesses. Her smile broadened as she realized she could see again. She reached out gingerly for her magic and her smile died. The wall blocking her power was still there, cracks and chips marred the surface which had been sheer as glass before, but it was still there. She tried to summon her daggers and swirls of shadow appeared in her hands, insubstantial and barely visible. A bright light swallowed Selth and she lost what little power she had been able to regain. Up ahead Aren stood with his staff, the tip of it glowing with a bright white light. Darkness dissipated all around him for twenty meters before transforming into the pitch black which had swallowed their group before. Looking out, she realized she could no longer see in the darkness but before she could complain to him, Kant and Mattle both stammered out thanks. Guiltily, she held back her protests. Her other companions couldn’t see in the dark, the least she could do was allow them the courtesy of sight. Besides, having limited access to her powers wasn’t really important for traversing the mountains. It would only have been helpful if the chains binding her had been destroyed completely. With a sigh, Selth reached out to touch the wall blocking her magic again. The chips and cracks which she had felt before were gone now, replaced with the sheer wall she was used to. Looking up, she realized that her companions had moved so that she was almost outside of the circle of light. Aren and the others watched her impatiently, even Raxous seemed to stare at her in a way that said, ‘get a move on.’ Quickly, she moved up to them and they began traveling again.
Strangely shaped rocks loomed out of the ground and plants she had never seen before twisted in grotesque shapes all around them. Aren frowned at them as they moved, “This isn’t the way Ancarth described the mountains in his journals. He said that they were a place filled with strange animals and plants, yes, but that those things were still beautiful. Just different, adapted to survive in an environment no other living thing had ever had to endure before.”
Selth’s stomach twisted into knots and she stepped up to one of the plants and bent to examine it. With a sinking feeling she saw that a sticky black gunk covered the plant. It reeked of evil and as she watched tiny strands reached out to grab her. “Selth!” Mattle shouted and Kant’s strong hand grabbed her shoulder and yanked her back to the trail just as one of the strangely formed rocks lunged towards the spot she had been kneeling on.
“What did I say about following me closely!” Aren thundered as Kant dragged Selth towards him. She stared in shock at where the rock was slowly pulling itself back into its former shape, “Stick behind me or die in these mountains. How much clearer do I have to be?”
“What was that?” she gasped, completely ignoring what he had just shouted at her.
Aren rubbed his forehead and looked away in disgust, “A living rock. The first living things on this planet, as far as I am aware. They don’t need food to survive, but a nice bit of fresh blood never goes amiss, and you can’t tell which rocks are alive and which ones aren’t. So again, stick to my path. It’s the only way through these mountains.”
Selth nodded her agreement and Kant and Mattle quickly echoed her. Both of them were standing stock still, staring at the rock which had finished reasserting its position, one more twisted object in a twisted landscape. “It’s just, the plants. What you said. I had to see for myself.” she stammered out, still struggling with the shock of being attacked by a rock.
“What do you mean, you had to see for yourself?” Aren asked sharply, his face changing from fury to wary curiosity in an instant.
“The plants,” she swallowed hard, pulling her cloak more closely around herself, “They’re covered in the same gunk as we saw back in Mardule.”
“So the corruption has spread into the mountains,” Kant said, managing to tear his eyes away from the looming rock, “I wouldn’t have thought that any magic could affect this place but that’s not my area of expertise. I suppose whatever mage was corrupting Mardule decided to hit the mountains as well.”
Selth glared at Kant. “Don’t be a fool,” she said, imitating Aren’s voice as best she could. “That gunk vanished as soon as the traiganidorian did. No mage corrupted Mardule, that was the work of the beast, at Atlatraigan’s behest.”
Aren, Kant, and Mattle all swung to face her with looks of astonishment on their faces. “What the hell would Mardule’s general have to do with the traiganidorian?” Kant demanded in a rough growl, his question echoed by Aren in only slightly softer tones.
Selth opened her mouth to reply but she was cut off by a curse from Aren. “Never mind now! We’re running out of time. Didn’t I say that getting through the mountains would be tricky? And here we’ve wasted half an hour because Selth couldn’t stay away from the plants. We must go!” he spun and started running down the path that he had chosen. Suddenly he turned around and Selth nearly ran into him, “But don’t think I’m forgetting that question. Wh
en we stop you are going to tell me exactly what Atlatraigan has to do with traiganidorians.” She swallowed hard and nodded then Aren led them along the trail.
More massive monoliths loomed at every twist and turn in the path and countless twisted plants stretched out with their gunk covered stems to grab at the five companions. Selth shuddered violently whenever one of them actually managed to get a strand of black gunk onto her clothing. In normal times, the plants would have been beautiful, they shone with a luminescence of their own in a kaleidoscope of colors when Aren’s light fell upon them, but the traiganidorian gunk somehow twisted that light so it seemed sinister and deadly.
Aren led the group over and around the valleys and hills that separated the different mountains that made up the Mountains of Endless Night. He led them through massive talus fields and through caves that made the dark of the mountains seem to be as bright as a noon day sun. Sometimes massive crevasses loomed in the distance, promising drops of thousands of feet or drops and led all the way to Hell, if some of the oldest stories could be believed. Selth could imagine falling into one of those and never stopping until she had hit the center of Aulternanden itself. Sometimes creatures could be heard, scuttling along ahead or behind her and the others. The sound brought to mind giant scorpions and the hair on the back of her neck stood on end when she heard them.
Occasionally there were turns and forks in the path that Aren led them on. Every time that one of those came up he would stop and for several minutes he would chant under his breath, turning off the light of his staff to work more complicated magic. When he did, Selth could feel the darkness seep back into her, burning at the magic of the chains and giving her back some of her powers. Aren would keep muttering under his breath until a strange symbol, the mark of Ancarth the Black – a crescent moon set over three stars and under another five, with a scepter and staff crossed at the bottom – glowed a soft green on one of the possible paths. He would re-illuminate his staff and the darkness would leave Selth, although she always felt refreshed when it did, and he would lead the group down the path marked by the symbol. Once, Selth had asked what the other path led to at a fork in the road. “Certain death.” Aren replied before hurrying along the path he had chosen as being safe. She didn’t press for more and he didn’t say anything else about it.
After almost five hours of moving through the mountains, the corruption of the traiganidorians spread everywhere that she could see, the four of them came into a different area. Aren paused his rapid movement and leaned heavily on his staff, breathing hard from exerting himself for so long. Selth looked around in surprise, the darkness seemed lesser here, enough so that she could see things outside the circle of light. With surprise, she realized that there was no corruption polluting the plants which flourished. “Are we safe here?” Mattle panted from her side, causing her to jump. At her other side Raxous dropped to the ground, panting, with white foam flecked along his gums.
Aren laughed, wheezing as he leaned on his staff, and sweat dripped from his nose to the ground. “Safe? No boy, we’re not safe. We’re far less safe than we were before we stepped into this place. But it’s the only way through and we still have a few hours. It will have to be enough.” he pushed off his staff, breathing heavily.
“Why do we only have a few hours Aren?” Selth prodded the old mage gently.
He pulled his head up and looked intently at her, “You notice that there isn’t any traiganidorian corruption spread through this area?” She nodded slowly and he gave a smile that was more a grimace of pain than anything else, “That’s because there’s something far bigger and badder than any traiganidorian in here. Worse than any dragon residing on the high peaks of the mountains.”
“What?” Selth asked, shaken. She couldn’t imagine anything worse than a traiganidorian.
“A Baltoth.” Aren sighed, taking a deep breath and straightening, “A creature that is tied to one spot all its life. In that area they are God. Nothing can happen inside a Baltoth’s lair that it does not want and they aren’t too fond of intruders.” he chuckled softly, “Just one more example of how messed up these mountains are.”
“What the Hell are we doing here then?” Kant demanded, bent double just at the edge of the Baltoth’s realm.
Aren gave a wry smile, “Well, this is the path, the only path, and besides, Baltoths are nocturnal hunters. As long as we are able to get out of its realm before true night falls we’ll live. If not, we’ll all probably die at the same instant.” He took another deep breath and turned to face the Baltoth’s realm, “So let’s go!” he shouted and took off running.
Selth gave a slight groan but followed after him as quickly as she could. If this creature was more powerful than a traiganidorian she didn’t want to have any sort of confrontation with it. As they ran she saw why the Mountains of Endless Night were a beautiful place. Without the traiganidorian corruption, the plants stood tall and straight. Small creatures darted across her path, strange cousins to the animals that she knew from Andin. She saw a hare like creature run across the trail, its skin slightly luminescent, especially at the face, so that the ground in front of it was always lit up. Other creatures had no eyes but had massive ears and noses to compensate for the fact that they couldn’t see.
In one area, a massive grove of strange plants soared high above the ground. They looked almost like trees except they didn’t have any bark, just long trunks that surrounded a glowing liquid. As Selth watched particles of brightness shifted around inside the trunks so that different parts of the tree appeared lighter or darker. Massive creatures with long narrow beaks surrounded the grove, breaking into the trunks and sucking away at the liquid contained within. When they removed their beaks the small hole that was created quickly hardened back into a smooth surface. She wished that she could stop and just observe all the life that was moving around them but Aren kept pushing them onwards. The animals they saw weren’t intruders here, Selth had to remind herself, she was.
She used thoughts of the Baltoth to keep herself motivated and forced herself to keep pace with Aren. The landscape flew by all around them, never changing from the same gentle rolling hills and massive groves of strange trees. It was beautiful to look at but as Selth watched the darkness around Aren’s pool of light slowly became deeper. Aren kept increasing his pace, as though hoping he could outrun the change in color if only he pushed their group harder.
The five of them stumbled to a stop in front of a massive cliff that rose, unbroken, to form the base of one of the mountains. Aren barely spared his four panting companions a glance before shouting, “This way!” and with a wave of his staff turned to the left and dashed along the ground by the cliff. “Do you want to get killed? We only have about five minutes to get to the end of the cliff before the Baltoth wakes up and we all die!”
Selth took a deep breath and ran after him. Five minutes ticked down to four and four down to three without the cliff reaching an end. She was sweating profusely, and her legs were nearing the point of failure, but she kept running. Just as their time was running out they made it past the cliff and out into the corrupt darkness that comprised the rest of the Mountains of Endless Night. Selth collapsed on the ground, chest heaving from the exertion of having run for several hours with the threat of death looming over her head. Aren poked her in the ribs with his staff, hard. “Get up! We’re not safe yet!” he said to her and the two inquisitors, even managing to include Raxous in his glare, “The mountains are far more dangerous at night and our safe spot is still some ten minutes away.”
Selth pushed herself upright with a groan and trotted after him as he moved off again. He led them up a twisting path, which ascended to the top of the massive cliff they had just moved across, then turned back down the cliff as it topped out in a wide ledge. All five of them stumbling with exhaustion, she followed him as he brought them across the cliff face to a wide circle, marked out with arcane symbols. A large mark, the one Aren had used to identify the safe paths through the
mountains, glowed brightly as they entered the circle then winked out as though it had never existed. He dropped his pack to the ground and lay up against it. “Now, we’re safe.” he said tiredly and dropped off to sleep. Selth let out a huge sigh of relief and did the same as the light from Aren’s staff faded to nothing.
26
Dreams of Darkness
As the battle came to its close, Az’emon with his foot upon the neck of Shattrenlix, it is said Time itself froze. In that moment, the traitor Lord of Light and Darkness turned upon his new master and Chaos unraveled. For a moment, just a moment, Order was the only power in creation. A moment was enough.
– Heresies from the End of the War of Order
A swirling darkness, deeper than the dark of the Mountains of Endless Night, deeper than the dark of the caves Selth had passed through, deeper than anything she could imagine assembled itself in her head as she dropped into the haven of sleep. It was shocking how many levels of darkness there were. Everybody could tell the different shades of light, going up to the purest white, but nobody could tell the difference between shades of darkness. They all just saw black after a certain point. As Selth drifted through darkness a shape formed before her, a twisting wraith of different shades of darkness which seemed at once as large as the world and as small as a pebble, as powerful as lightning and as helpless as a mouse.
“My lord.” the words echoed through her head as though they came from a far-off place. The voice of the wraith was a deep resonating thing, seeming to fill the void through which Selth drifted. It embodied the meaning of darkness, it was cold and it was frightening but beneath that it was filled with laughter. Darkness was deception, even more so than shadows. It was terrifying but only because people wanted it to terrify them. Because Darkness was the unknown and nothing is more terrifying than the unknown.
The God in the Shadows (The Story at the Heart of the Void Book 1) Page 29