Shadowkeep

by Alan Dean Foster - (ebook by Undead)

  “Treasure beyond compare,” Maryld murmured. She was seated behind a heavy wooden table that itself stood on a raised platform. A pile of books sat by her right hand. She was perusing the one that lay open on the table before her.

  The light in the room came from two towering brass candlesticks that flanked her. The candles they supported burned steadily without melting. Painted globes served as table legs. Praetor did not recognize the lands they depicted.

  But Hargrod went immediately to one and turned it slowly until he’d located one particular place. He pointed to it and looked pleased.

  “There iss the bay that I have sspoken of, the place where I would buy land for my family.”

  Praetor bent to study the globe. “Where are we now on this thing?”

  “I am not ssure. The bay I know only becausse it wass once sshown to me by a Zhiss’ta of much learning.” He studied the globe closely and hesitantly put a finger on a dark place far to the north of his dreamland. “Ssomewhere up here, I think.”

  “Gorwyther would know.” Praetor glanced back up at Maryld. “This must be his place of study.”

  “It doesn’t appear to have been disturbed,” she decided. “Dal’brad hasn’t had the time to spend in here yet, which means Gorwyther’s knowledge is still safe. We’re not too late. No doubt with Gorwyther safely out of the way, the demon king feels he has plenty of time in which to drain this library of its knowledge.” She shut the book before her.

  “So much wisdom at our very fingertips, and all of it useless without the wizard to interpret it for us.” She sighed, then dropped to the floor and began scanning the parquet tiles.

  “What are you looking for?” Sranul asked her.

  “A journal or diary of some kind. Not a record of experiments or work. Something personal written in Gorwyther’s own hand. The sort of notepad he might have kept close at hand. If there was such a thing, he might have had a chance to jot down a warning or plea for any who might come looking for him.”

  “Something that might be of use in freeing him, I see,” said the roo excitedly. He and his friends immediately fanned out around the table and joined in the hunt.

  “What would this diary or whatever look like?” Praetor asked her.

  “I don’t think it would be very bulky. It would be something he could carry with him everywhere. Not larger than pocket-sized, surely.” She bent to check under a seat cushion. “The spine might not be imprinted, or there might be nothing more than a date.”

  “Wouldn’t the wizard keep something that personal in a place of concealment?”

  “He might not have had the chance to hide it before he was taken. The very fact that he’s imprisoned suggests that the demon king surprised him. He might have had only a moment or two in which to make a note and quickly slip the book out of sight of his attackers. If he placed it somewhere in hopes of possible rescuers finding it, it should be somewhere obvious.”

  Hargrod lifted a massive tome on crustaceans, withdrew a small brown tome leaved in gold from beneath. “Might thiss be it?”

  The others crowded around as he handed it to Maryld. She opened it and her face lit up with excitement. “His daily diary, yes! Written in his own hand.” While she turned the pages and read, Praetor found himself glancing uneasily around the library. They had penetrated farther into Shadowkeep than anyone except demons, helped along by a fortuitous mix of skill and luck. Their skills remained sharp, but their luck couldn’t last forever.

  Maryld turned another page and her expression fell. She flipped through the rest quickly, without enthusiasm.

  “What’s wrong?” Sranul asked.

  “Blank. The rest of the pages are blank.” She held the book up to the light and flipped the empty pages backward. “Or are they? We’ve found similarly ‘empty’ volumes. Maybe they’re full of insightful inscriptions that Gorwyther has disguised.” She lowered the book and concentrated on one blank page for a long while, finally gave up and rubbed at her eyes.

  “It’s no use. I see only blank paper.”

  “Let me see.” She handed it to Praetor. As she did so, something fell from between the front pages. He knelt and picked it up.

  “What iss it?” Hargrod asked.

  “Looks like a very thin piece of glass.”

  “It’s just the bookmark,” said the discouraged Maryld.

  Praetor studied it and frowned, wondering to himself. Why would anyone, least of all a wizard of Gorwyther’s stature, use a bookmark in a small daily diary? “A magnifying lens,” he suggested.

  “We don’t know that Gorwyther had poor eyesight,” Maryld argued, “but it could be.” She shrugged. “Keep it. It may prove useful later.”

  “For what?” Sranul wondered. “Reading blank paper?” Praetor shoved it into a pocket.

  “No, my long-eared complainer. It belonged to the wizard. Who knows what it might do in his presence, or if we pass near to him? It might be nothing more than what it appears to be, or it might be a key. Perhaps Gorwyther left no message for Dal’brad’s minions to find and erase. Perhaps he left only that.”

  “That’s what bothers me about this place,” the roo groused. “Too many perhapses.”

  “Let uss ssearch a while longer,” Hargrod suggested. “We may yet find ssomething usseful.”

  They made a thorough search of the library but encountered nothing else of promise. Finally they reassembled in the middle of the room.

  “Now what?” Sranul demanded to know.

  There were two doors opening into the library. One they had entered through. The other barred the far end of the room. Praetor shrugged, nodded toward the closed portal.

  “We know what’s behind us. I’d rather head on. Maybe it opens into the same hallway, but we might as well find out. A step back the way we’ve come is a step into the arms of any pursuers.”

  They left the candesticks burning behind them. Praetor put a hand on the door at the far end of the library and pushed. It opened easily at his touch.

  Beyond lay a much smaller room, as empty as the library was full. There were no bookshelves, no tables, nothing at all except naked stone and at the far end of the chamber, a single statue of grotesque appearance.

  “Our firsst demon,” Hargrod observed, “and it cannot harm uss. A good omen.”

  “You and your omens.” Sranul hopped toward it, the others following.

  The statue was no taller than the roo. Its clawed hands were extended, palms upward, as if in supplication. Behind the statue was a large, curved mirror.

  “Dead end,” said the roo brusquely. “Seems we go back out through the library after all.”

  “Not necessarily.” Maryld made a circuit of the statue, which was carved of some smooth, polished stone, inspecting it minutely. When she’d completed this study, she turned her attention to the mirror behind it. Her eyes shifted continually back and forth from mirror to statue.

  “Let us consider, my friends. This room seemingly has no use. It is too barren to be a place of worship, and there is nothing stored here except this statue and mirror. Yet no one constructs a room to no purpose. The door from the library appears to be the only way in or out.”

  “The last room we saw that was this empty,” Sranul said uneasily, “held the Brollachian.” He found himself looking for vents or outlets in the ceiling. It was solid rock, but he still couldn’t relax.

  “It musst be a private temple of ssome kind.” Hargrod approached the statue. “An asscetic might usse ssuch a bare place for meditation. He would not want ssuch disstractionss ass decorationss might provide.” He indicated the upturned palms of the graven image. “Ssee, it iss ass if thesse wait for ssome kind of offering.”

  “How do you explain the mirror?” Sranul asked him.

  “Designed to reflect the gaze of the ssupplicant back at himsself, sso that he may conssider hiss own unworthinesss in the pressence of whatever god or deity thiss sstatue repressentss.”

  “We didn’t come here to pray to th
e demon king’s gods,” said Praetor decisively. “We’ll have to go back out through the library and find another way.”

  Maryld stood there shaking her head as her male companions turned to depart. “Forgetful. So forgetful.”

  “Of what?” asked Sranul challengingly.

  “Of deceptions. Have you forgotten so quickly? The false vault below, the containers which held everything but treasure? Did you not hear what I said a moment ago? No one constructs a room for no purpose. Hargrod, your guess was good, but, I believe, wrong. This is not a private temple, though it is carefully designed to look like one. Previous attempts have been made to distract us with something. Here the idea is to distract with nothing.”

  “It’s succeeded in that,” said Sranul. “If there’s more than nothing here, then where is it?”

  She turned. “I don’t know—yet. But it must have something to do with this statue, or mirror, or both.”

  “Souse-weed,” the roo muttered, hopping forward. “This mirror, for example, is intended to do just what Hargrod said it was intended to do. It’s just an ordinary mirror. See?” He put his hand on the smooth surface.

  It went right through.

  Sranul let out a yelp and jerked his hand back, was immensely relieved when he saw he still possessed his usual number of fingers.

  “There iss much to be ssaid for the cautiouss, analytical approach,” observed Hargrod sagely, “but directnesss hass itss virtuess ass well.”

  “You okay?” Praetor asked him, stepping forward to examine the roo’s hand.

  Sranul nodded. “It tingles a little, but that’s all.”

  “Could you feel anything on the other side?” Maryld asked him.

  “No. The air was cooler, I think.”

  Praetor reached forward and felt nothing as his hand passed through the solid glass. He bent his hand back toward himself. “Stone wall on the other side, just like here. It’s another gate, like the wall of colors and the wall of blackness. Another doorway.”

  “Sure, but a doorway to where?” Sranul mumbled.

  “Does it matter? It leads onward, and that’s where we want to go.”

  “I’d prefer a more precisely defined destination,” the roo objected.

  “You went without quesstion through a wall of changing colorss,” Hargrod reminded him. “Why hessitate at the thought of doing likewisse through a mirror?”

  “I went through a wall of colors because the father of all trolls and his unlovely helpers were chasing me,” the roo said. “No one’s chasing me now.”

  “You are still not thinking, my good roo,” Maryld told him. “There is no need to set up such an elaborate deception unless you have something to hide. You do not make traps difficult to find, you make them obvious and appealing. You don’t conceal them in mirrors. You hide them in things like sword cases.”

  Sranul let the remembrance pass. “All right, I’ll go through—but only if Praetor goes first.”

  “Don’t I always?” Praetor murmured. There was no hint of sarcasm in his voice. It would’ve been inappropriate. He was, after all, the leader. Maryld might be more knowledgeable, Hargrod might be stronger, Sranul quicker, but they all deferred to him when it came time to make an irreversible move. “It’s decided, then. We go through the mirror.”

  He considered the reflective surface. It was plenty big enough to admit him. If it would admit him. The passage of a hand was no guarantee of anything. There were no guarantees in Shadowkeep.

  Suppose it turned solid when he was halfway through? Became a real mirror hanging on a real wall? Would half of him fall through to the other side and his back half tumble at the feet of his stunned friends?

  As usual, there was only one way of finding out. He took a deep breath and stepped through.

  For an instant he seemed to slow and it was as if he were walking through gelatin. Then there was air around him again. Turning, he saw a mirror hanging innocently on a wall. He tried to reach through it, struck unyielding glass.

  He’d been half right. His passage had turned the wall solid again, but only after he’d gone through. Now he was cut off from his companions, perhaps forever.

  Then a hand came through, a small hand, feminine and petite. He grasped it and the fingers curled tightly in his as he helped Maryld through.

  “That wasn’t so bad,” she said. “An unpleasant, greasy sensation, but not an intolerable one.”

  More hands and a long snout appeared as Sranul followed close on the thaladar’s heels. Hargrod brought up the rear.

  “We can’t go back,” Praetor informed them. To demonstrate, he rapped his knuckles on the now solid glass. “The gate is one-way.”

  “Maybe,” Sranul murmured nervously, “it’s designed not to keep others out, but to keep something in.”

  They turned and began to inspect the room the mirror had deposited them in. The walls made a sharp turn to the right. Beyond lay brighter light.

  Praetor led them around the bend. “Something back here,” he told them.

  Something indeed. The corridor opened onto a large, domed chamber. In its center was a carved stone platform and atop the platform an enormous crystal globe of milky white. The light in the room came from within the crystal itself.

  There was nothing else in the chamber. Not a stick of furniture, not a bas-relief on the wall: nothing. Maryld bent to examine the inscriptions that had been chiseled into the stone platform. They were unlike any she had ever seen.

  Sranul circled the platform warily, checking the other walls. “No mirrors. No walls of light or blackness to step through. This really is a dead end this time.”

  Hargrod was using the handle of his ax to tap the rockwork. “Not necesssarily, my friend. We have become sso ussed to looking for magical wayss of entering and leaving placess that we might eassily overlook ssomething ass ssimple ass a concealed door.”

  “Let’s not be in such a rush to leave. There may be something here of value to us.” Suddenly he leaned forward, until his face was almost pressing against the crystal. “I’ll be damned. There’s someone inside!”

  His friends hurried to join him in probing the crystal’s depths.

  “Sure is.” Sranul reached out and touched it. The surface was slick and unexpectedly warm.

  “What do you think, Maryld? Is it Gorwyther?”

  She stared silently at the softly glowing globe. “I can’t tell. It’s hard to see very deep. It could be. I wish I could have read some of that book we found.”

  Sranul had his face pressed sideways against the crystal. “It doesn’t look much like a wizard to me.”

  “How would you know what a wizard lookss like, long-nosse?” Hargrod taunted him.

  “I’ve been around. I’m an educated person,” Sranul shot back. “And I say that’s no wizard in there.” He looked again, out of his other eye. “It doesn’t look like a demon, either.”

  “I do not conssider you an expert on either.”

  “None of us is,” Praetor put in. He turned his attention back to the crystal. “Whoever or whatever it is, someone’s gone to a lot of trouble to make sure it can’t move freely about.”

  “It can’t be a demon,” Maryld said. “Dal’brad can control his underlings, and as a punishment it’s far too elaborate. Rebellious minions can be restrained without having to go to the trouble of imprisoning them in crystal.” She ran her fingernails along the perfect curve of the sphere. “You only go to this much trouble to hamper the movements of an enemy, not an ally.”

  “Then it could be Gorwyther,” Praetor said.

  She nodded. “It could. Or it could be someone else.”

  Hargrod hefted his massive ax. “Let uss find out.”

  “No, Hargrod.” She stepped between him and the sphere. “Not that way. Your ax will not penetrate. Even if you could cut the crystal away piece by piece it would take too long.” She glanced significantly toward the mirror. “We may not have much time left.”

  “Very well. Where mag
ic iss concerned I defer to you.” The Zhis’ta shouldered his ax and stepped back. “How will you free the trapped one?”

  She turned to regard the sphere. “I don’t know. But there must be a way. No prison is invulnerable. I wish I knew what magic to use.”

  “There was the wand-key,” Sranul pointed out, “but it’s still stuck in the vault door.”

  “And we still have the staff that Hargrod retrieved from the Brollachian’s pool,” she said. Hargrod had removed it from the vault handle when they’d departed. Now she extended both hands and he passed it over to her.

  She assumed a strong stance in front of the crystal. “Move clear. I don’t know what’s going to happen when I try this.”

  Praetor took a step toward her. “Let me. I’m quicker than you and can take a heavier blow. Besides, if something goes dangerously wrong, you’ll be able to puzzle it out better than I will.”

  She hesitated for a long moment, their eyes locked. Then she nodded reluctantly and handed the staff over.

  “Never let anyone say that you lacked courage, Praetor Fime.”

  He shrugged it off. “Just being sensible. If this… doesn’t work out, then you must go on with Sranul and Hargrod. Promise me that.”

  She nodded once again. Then the three of them retreated to take cover behind the turn in the corridor.

  Praetor hefted the staff, holding it firmly in both hands. He could hear the thaladar muttering strange words behind him. He raised the staff over his head and brought it down sharply. It made a ringing sound when it struck the crystal.

  Nothing happened. He hit it a second time. His wrists tingled from the shock of the impact, but the crystal did not react. Turning, he gazed helplessly back at his companions. They started to rejoin him.

  As they did so, the glow from the sphere began to intensify. They ran for cover again and Praetor went with them. He held the staff out in front of him as if it might afford them some protection.

  The glow increased until they had to shield their eyes to look toward the platform. The ringing echo of Praetor’s blow grew louder and louder, repeating itself down the corridors of time.