The Black Keep (The Chronicles of Llars)

by Tom Bielawski

  Table of Contents

  Title Page

  Copyright

  Dedication

  A Word About Cystic Fibrosis

  Map

  Chapter 1

  Chapter 2

  Chapter 3

  Chapter 4

  Chapter 5

  Chapter 6

  Chapter 7

  Chapter 8

  Chapter 9

  Chapter 10

  Chapter 11

  Chapter 12

  The Sigil Disk

  About the Author

  The Dragon Writers Collective

  More From Me

  Contact

  The Chronicles of Llars

  Volume Two:

  The Black Keep

  By Tom BielawskI

  The Black Keep

  Tom Bielawski

  Copyright Tom Bielawski 2012

  Published by Tom Bielawski Publishing

  For my Sun and Stars,

  For my Champ,

  For my Princess.

  A word about Cystic Fibrosis (CF)

  I am a CF dad; someone I love needs a cure.

  CF is a genetic, inherited, disease that affects the lungs and digestive systems of about 30,000 children and adults in the United States, and 70,000 worldwide. A defective gene and its protein product cause the body to produce unusually thick and sticky mucus that:

  -Clogs the lungs and leads to life-threatening lung infections;

  -Obstructs the pancreas and stops the natural enzymes from helping the body break down and absorb food.

  This disease used to be a death sentence. Now, more and more people with CF are living into their 30's, 40's and beyond. And that is thanks in large part to organizations like Cystic Fibrosis Foundation (CFF) and others who have supported and driven the research community with awesome fundraisers, studies, and media attention.

  Please support CFF.org, Cystic Life (cysticlife.org), Boomer Esiason Foundation (esiason.org), or any other great organization that is helping to fight this terrible disease.

  Thank you,

  Tom Bielawski

  C H A P T E R

  1

  Lordsdeep

  Carym was numb. The wispy image of the ghostly soldiers danced before his eyes and were gone. His mind reeled as his body tried to return to its normal temperature and his brain tried to recall what had just happened. It was as though he had left himself, momentarily, and someone else had stepped in.

  But who?

  The horrific events of the day came roaring back and he fell to his knees, stunned. After escaping the pursuit of the dreaded Shugu’s fleet, the ship he and Zach had been traveling on had gone below the seas! Then it had been attacked by a pod of vicious sea-beasts and was critically damaged. He and Zach, the Keneerie woman, and two of the crew, only survived the encounter by abandoning the ship in a small escape craft.

  The escape craft that surfaced in the long lost and forgotten realm far, far, below the surface of the world in the infamous place known as the Underllars. Zach had been overcome with greed at the sight of the buildings of pure sapphire and emerald and wandered off on his own. And that was when the spirit of an ancient defender of this lost realm, known in surface lore as Lordsdeep, and arrived and delivered a dire warning.

  Any doubts Carym may have had about the supernatural nature of the ghostly beings faded as the images of the ghosts themselves faded from sight. When he turned to face his friends he saw that Gefar, the Marineer’s only surviving crewman, had apparently begun to thaw out and was stomping his feet and rubbing his hands vigorously, trying to stimulate circulation. The cold blast of air that heralded the presence of the ghostly warriors had nearly frozen them all to death.

  “Well, that one sure took a likin’ to you! What did he say? And what did you say?” asked Yag, the captain of the doomed Marineer.

  “What do you mean?” asked Carym with a blank expression. “Didn’t you hear him?”

  “We all heard him. None of us understood a word he said,” replied the privateer captain suspiciously. “And we sure didn’t understand what you said, either!”

  Carym looked to Gennevera for clarification but she only nodded thoughtfully. Carym shook his head. And why not? Now I’m talking to dead people! He realized he was letting his thoughts slip and focused on what was happening. Taking the bizarre experience for what it was worth, he decided to translate for his friends.

  “Evidently this is, in fact, a Dalcasian city; Roeyl he named it,” Carym paused for a moment to see if the name sounded familiar to anyone. He was unsurprised when Gennevera spoke up.

  “Roeyl is the Dalcasian name for the legendary city known to us as Lordsdeep,” she said in hushed tones. Carym nodded and looked back to the men.

  “You speak their language, Carym?” asked Gefar still rubbing his freezing hands together.

  “No,” Carym shook his head emphatically. “I don’t know why the leader chose me, and I don’t know why I was able to understand him.”

  Carym had a very real idea why he had suddenly been able to understand the man who was apparently a specter; and it had something to do with the stones in his coat pocket.

  “He warned us to mind our manners and said that Zach may be in trouble; he may be placing himself - and us - at greater risk.”

  “Of what?” asked Gefar.

  “He only said that the powers of darkness are strong in the deep and went on to say they were fighting their own war. Although he mentioned we may find what we seek in the Blood Spire.” Carym looked to Gennevera. “What is your evaluation, Sister of Grymm?”

  He was surprised to see that eagerness disappear from her eyes at the mention of her order. “With help from Grymm, I was able to hear and understand some of your conversation,” she said.

  “I understand all who speak from the underworld, but the longer they are gone, the harder it is to hear their words; and these men are very long gone. I sense that this location is close to what we call a rift in the fabric of creation. These kinds of rifts sometimes allow beings from the underworld to enter Llars and allow mortals to cross into the Underworld.” Gennevera shuddered and looked into the distance as she finished. “The Underllars is but one step away from the Underworld!”

  “Wonderful. We have to find Zach and find a way out of here,” said Carym urgently.

  “Might be we ought to leave ’im behind,” offered Gefar, clearly back in control of his body. “He chose his own path, he did.”

  “He has a point, Carym. We shouldn’t waste much time looking for him. Better to search the city for a way to the surface. Maybe Zach will show up by the time we’re ready to leave,” said Yag.

  “Bad things are livin’ in the Deep Realms; troks, warves, oroks, an’ other nasties,” said Gefar, looking nervously about in the dim light of Dalcasia. “We ought to go.”

  When Carym hesitated, Yag came to his side. “I know yer friend is gone, but he made his choice. Way I see it, if he comes back at all, it won’t be too soon.”

  Carym grunted but said nothing.

  “I say we give him till sunrise tomorrow.”

  Carym let out a deep breath and nodded. There was little choice. They must find a way out of this city and away from the dangers of the Deep Realms; he only prayed that Zach would be ok.

  After the companions rested and rationed their food by a small fire, they decided to move deeper into the city and find better shelter.

  Carym and his three companions set out along the road that led to the city gate. The air was cool and still and every small sound they made seemed unnecessarily loud in the eerie quiet. The road was amazingly smooth and made from perfectly laid stone bric
ks of a mineral completely unknown the travelers. There appeared to be very little wear to the stones although they must have been set in place nearly a dozen centuries ago.

  The silence of the massive cavern was chilling, the sounds of the group’s footfalls echoing loudly; the warnings of otherworldly beings and the dark races of the Deep Realms were ever present on their minds. More than once Carym peered quickly about at buildings lining road and thought he saw shadows flitting in and out of windows. Every now and then the group would call a halt to listen for something they thought they heard in a building, but after doing a quick search found nothing. The buildings here, beautifully designed and crafted, still had some remnants of the former owners though it was apparent that some raiding by oroks or troks had occurred over the centuries. Oddly though, some things were remarkably intact for being nearly twelve centuries old. The consistent temperature and lack of wind and rain perfectly preserved items in some buildings; furniture and paintings for instance. In one building, which was apparently a home of some kind, Carym found a child’s toy that resembled a covered wagon but had no mechanism for securing horses. Its wheels were made of some peculiar soft and squeezable substance. The toy fascinated him, for inside the covered part were seats with all manner of levers, buttons, and even another wheel.

  Odd place for a spare wheel, he thought. Unless it’s meant to steer, like a ship.

  As much as he was fascinated by the toy, and would have enjoyed studying it at length during their travels, he felt it disrespectful to spend more than a few moments scrutiny and placed it back on its shelf. The group desperately hoped they would find something of use to them in the ancient city, maybe even a map to help them find their way. Yet the few inscriptions or books they found were written in an ancient language none could decipher. Yag asked Gennevera to call upon a wandering spirit to translate, but she cautioned that these spirits were rarely helpful. Most were notoriously stubborn and would lie for sport while others would say whatever it was you wanted to hear in order to keep your company a while longer. The group decided it was not worth risking a wild goose chase and continued on toward the city gate, hoping to find the Blood Spire quickly.

  Carym wondered what life must have been like in this city here in the belly of the world so long ago. He wondered what manner of transportation they used to get around on hard ground and wondered what manner of livestock could survive down here with neither grass nor sunlight. Did they import all of their foodstuffs from the distant surface? Carym thought that unlikely, and wondered if the ancients relied on fishing instead. Then he let out a deep breath, wishing his old fishing buddy had not wandered off.

  They passed through the gates to the city and the foursome marveled at its construction. The gate consisted of an arch made entirely of the rare and valuable golden marble with beautiful carvings and painted images. It was here that the walls of the massive cavern came together and formed a wall with the gate leading to a cavern on the other side. The scenes of the artwork were varied but focused much on the maritime industry, which had to have been critical to the survival of a subsurface nation. The ships pictured here, Carym noted, were similar to the now wrecked Marineer.

  The group walked on through the gates but not without noticing defensive mechanisms everywhere; massive ballistae, arrow slots, covered pits, and giant cauldrons for oil or boiling water. They noticed the portcullis as they walked under it with massive spikes and retractable pins to lock it in place in the holes below their feet. Carym was certain that the defensive mechanisms were important to a city made entirely of precious stone and metal. Even though the city was silent and still, he couldn’t help but feel as though a great evil was lurking in the shadows. He feared what Umber had in store for them next. After all, the Dark Lord seemed to own the shadows.

  After passing through the long tunnel that served as the entrance to the city, they emerged on the other side and were awestruck by what they saw. This city was as large as any major city in the Arnathian Empire that Carym had ever seen. Even Yag and Gefar who had sailed much of the known world together could say nothing for long moments. While the city had been laid out with meticulous mathematical precision, each building set at precise angles and aligned perfectly with its neighbors, and all streets ran at precise intervals with side streets branching off in much the same way, this was not what had struck the group dumb. Rather it was the sparkling radiance of the unimaginable wealth that lay here in the forms of the silent buildings alone. Even the outer areas of the city, and the port areas they had passed, paled in comparison to the wealth before them. How could all this have survived without plunder? And the farther in they walked, the more abundantly opulent it became. The light posts, which must have been enchanted to remain lit, appeared to be housed in globes of diamond or pure crystal, Carym couldn’t tell which.

  Carym began to think the sounds and fears were just products of his overactive imagination and he was even beginning to question whether the encounter with the Dalcasian guards hadn’t been part of his imagination. Was all of this some terrible dream? No, he realized; it was not a dream. Seeing the soaring towers made of ruby and gold and sapphire and emerald in the center of the city, the foursome agreed the Blood Spire must be among them and began their trek down a wide boulevard leading toward the city center.

  The street was lined on both sides by long two-story buildings that ran the entire length of the street breaking only at intersections. Doors with small porches appeared at regular intervals and fenced walkways opened to the street. Carym noticed Gefar veering toward the side of the street, and he could see what caught the Roughneck’s attention. One of these homes had a fenced walkway leading from the street to the front door, the stakes of the fence were made of shining silver with long sharp blades poised atop them. There was a gate at the end of the walkway, Gefar reached the gate and paused peering toward the large open door. Something wasn’t right.

  “Why haven’t the oroks plundered this city and dismantled it brick by precious brick?” asked Carym, warily watching Gefar. For some reason, he felt like it was not a good idea to enter that house.

  “Oroks ’re stupid beasts, barely intelligent enough to speak. They have little sense of value and exist much like animals do; eating, sleeping, hunting. Only thing is, oroks are as mean and wicked as they come. Don’t have use for money, so they take whatever fancies them at the moment,” replied the old captain. Carym had never encountered oroks before. He knew they were of the Orkine races, and he had faced hurkin before, but even the wicked hurkin were extraordinarily intelligent beings that could reason; the murderous oroks were not nearly so nice.

  Suddenly arrows rained down on Gefar from the windows above. Quickly, the hardened Roughneck rolled to the side with his shield up. One of the arrows lodged into Gefar’s shield as he found refuge near the perimeter wall of the building. The companions quickly moved away from the killing arrows.

  From behind the light pole where he was hidden, Carym spied flitting shadows within the house. He thought of simply calling to his friends and organizing a retreat, but he knew he would be harried by these bandits if the situation wasn’t resolved now. The pulsing of the stones in his pouch called to him now, so strongly that he was feeling dizzy.

  No! He berated himself. I will not let this happen!

  With his sword in hand, Carym charged headlong to where Gefar was pinned down, unable to move out from behind the stone fence on the adjoining home. Daggers of pure blue light flitted across Carym’s field of vision and into the bandits’ house as he ducked down next to the Roughneck. A shriek followed by sputtering in a foreign tongue told Carym that someone had been struck. Following the streak left in the air by the mystical missiles, Carym saw that they had originated from where Gennevera had hunkered down. Her powers intrigued him and he began to wonder exactly what else she was capable of.

  Carym called on his military training; when ambushed during a patrol, advance into the direction of the enemy with full force, using every
weapon at your disposal. Gefar had sustained a deep gash along his calf; it would slow him down, but it was not a vital hit. Carym knew that the Roughneck would be safe enough here and decided a charge into the fray was in order. He took a deep breath, watching the patterns of the enemies moving in the building, then ran down the walkway to the house as fast as he could, shouting as he went. Then three diminutive men wickedly armed with jagged blades and serrated swords appeared in his path spilling out from the door to the house, shouting their own battle cry. The Cklathman’s warrior instinct took over and left his muddled mind behind to wonder what kind of men these were while his body began fighting; it was like he was two persons acting in unison. In the heat of battle he often felt as though he was possessed of two minds; one watching everything transpire in slow motion and another making everything happen.

  The first of the wicked little men, dressed in black mail and leather armor with a large red star on the breast, fell quickly with a gash across his throat. Carym noticed abstractly that the little creature was still swinging his dark blade even as its lifeblood drained away, weakly sputtering curses and trying to kill. Before the first had fallen, the other two closed in with pole arms and were able to reach Carym from several feet away. Deftly Carym attacked with his sword and parried with a small shield, fighting both foes at once; their size belied their strength and skills and Carym was fighting hard to keep up with the two diminutive, but well trained, fighters.

  Then Yag appeared, lunging with surprising force into the flank of one creature, knocking the little beast to the ground with a blade in its belly. Yag fell with it. Still though, the hardy little fighter got up after Yag took to his feet and lunged at the surprised captain’s legs, slicing into his calf deeply. Then the little man fell suddenly to the ground dead, leaving Yag grateful that he didn’t have to tangle with it any further.