Cythera brought her hand up to her mouth and gnawed anxiously on one fingernail. “You said it didn’t smell like hemlock. The poison on the dart. What did it smell like? Did it smell of almonds? Or perhaps garlic?”
Malden shook his head. “No smell at all, really. It was the color of straw.”
“Was it liquid, or was it pasty?”
The thief stared at her. “Liquid,” he said. “What are you getting at? You knew he would have that fit. What do you know of poisons?”
She waved one hand in the air. “I mentioned that my mother’s a witch, Malden.”
“I have met her, you know,” he protested. Then he shook his head and said, “She taught you something of poisons?”
“There are more reagents, tinctures, and orpiments in her larder than you’d find in an apothecary’s shop. She uses them to brew potions, to make healing salves, special ointments-she taught me a little of the plants and compounds that heal, and, yes, a little of those that kill.”
She jumped up and ran to where the dart lay. She studied it carefully, then took a droplet of the poison between two fingertips and rubbed them together briskly. “It’s not hemlock, you’re right. Nor hebon of yew, though the symptoms are close… maybe henbane? He’s too lucid for it to be deadly nightshade.”
Malden looked down at the dwarf. Sweat slicked across Slag’s face, and his skin was a rosy pink-which looked decidedly unhealthy, since normally a dwarf’s skin was whiter than snow. Slag writhed and pushed Malden’s cloak off him, as if he had grown too hot. Consciousness had nearly fled him.
Malden ran over to where Cythera stood and whispered, “Will he perish?”
“Yes,” she said, looking him right in the eye. “Whether it happens in the next few minutes, though, or as much as a day from now, I can’t say. Not without knowing what kind of poison was on this dart, how much of a dose he received-and a hundred other things I can’t begin to guess at.”
“You must know an antidote, though. Surely there is one!”
“If I could get him out of here-if I could bring him to Coruth, perhaps. But she’s hundreds of miles away.”
“We have to try. If he has any chance at all.” He reached over and took her hand. “Cythera, I know you won’t want to hear it. But this means we have to escape from the Vincularium as fast as we can. We can’t go looking for Croy.”
Her mouth formed a hard line but she didn’t look away from his eyes.
“You’re right,” she said. The words came as if they’d been dragged out of her.
Malden nodded and turned around, intending to build some kind of litter out of the tents they carried in their packs. He stopped, though, when he saw that Slag was crawling across the floor.
“Stop that this instant,” Cythera said.
Slag halted his forward progress. Yet he looked up at them and said, “Fuck off. I know I’m dying. You don’t have to fucking whisper about it. Before I go, though, I have to see what’s behind that door. I have to know if it’s still there.”
Chapter Forty-six
“What was that sound, just now?” Croy asked.
Morget turned and shook his head to indicate he’d heard nothing.
“It sounded like someone screaming, very far away.”
The barbarian stopped where he was and tilted his head to one side. “Nothing,” he said. “Perhaps a gust of wind, howling through these ruins. Did it sound to you like your woman?”
“… No,” Croy admitted. “You must be right. Let’s hurry onward, all the same.”
They had found a spiral ramp that led upward to a higher level. A thin stream of water rolled down the ramp and made their footing precarious, but Croy was able to climb with one hand along the rough stone wall.
At the top of the ramp they found a long, low tunnel, perhaps twenty feet wide, its ceiling not much higher than their heads. It ran away from them into darkness. Croy hardly trusted his sense of direction at that point, but he believed the tunnel headed back in the direction of the main shaft.
The floor was slick with water, and a thin vapor coiled around his ankles. The tunnel was filled with broad stone racks, standing in uniform rows. Each rack had four shelves, and each shelf was packed tight with a type of object he didn’t recognize. They were cylindrical in shape, though some were squatter than others, and some taller. Each was wrapped tightly in coarse fabric with a broad weave. They gave off a peculiar smell of dampness and must, and Croy thought they must be rotting away after so long underground in the wet.
Farther along the corridor, narrow side passages opened to either side. Morget took the one on the left, Croy on the right, and when they came back together in the center they each could report they’d seen the same thing-more long, wet corridors, more racks, myriad more cylinders wrapped in fabric. There were at least a dozen such tunnels, and every one was filled in exactly the same manner.
Croy’s curiosity got the better of him. He mounted his candle on top of one rack to free his hands. Then he lifted one of the cylinders from the rack and carefully unwrapped it. It was heavier than he’d expected it to be, but once open, it crumbled and fell apart easily. Inside the fabric he found three pounds of stinking black dirt. Clods of it broke off and pattered down along his cloak and struck his boots. A trickle of fine dirt rolled down the sleeve of his jerkin. Peering close in the darkness, he made out pale shapes inside the dark dirt, so he broke open the larger clods for a closer inspection. Growing inside the dirt were yellow-white fans of pulpy fungus.
“This is a farm,” he said, surprised. “Of course, the dwarves couldn’t grow proper crops down here-but mushrooms prosper under the earth. They don’t need the sun. All they need is a little damp. And some… night soil.”
He stared down at his filthy hands.
Morget stared at him. “What is that on your skin? It smells like shit.”
Croy dropped the unwrapped cylinder. Hurriedly, he bent down and washed his hands in the thin stream of water covering the floor.
Morget leaned over to sniff at one of the cylinders. Then he looked at Croy where he squatted. The barbarian let out a booming laugh that echoed wildly in the low-ceilinged tunnel.
“Ha ha ha,” he crowed. “Ha ha! The fancy knight has gotten himself all dirty! This is funny!”
Croy fought down a homicidal impulse and breathed deeply to clear his head. It was, after all, a little funny. He forced himself to smile. Then he rose to his full height and bowed deeply.
Morget was weeping from laughing so hard. He bent from the waist-it was not a bow-and then slowly straightened up.
Just in time for Croy to hurl one of the cylinders at his chest.
The cloth tore open on impact and three pounds of manure splattered across Morget’s laced-up cloak. Some of it got on his face.
“You-” Morget howled, and his hands came up to claw at the air. His eyes went wide with pure, unadulterated rage.
Maybe, Croy thought, I just made a mistake.
As Morget’s hands started to come down, Croy dashed sideways into the racks. He ducked low to hide himself from view. He could hear Morget rushing toward him, perhaps intent on slaughtering him for the insult.
The barbarian was twice Croy’s size. He held an Ancient Blade equal to Croy’s own, and plenty of other weapons he could use in his weak hand. If the two of them came to blows, Croy knew it would go hard on him.
He reached down to put a hand on Ghostcutter’s hilt. The barbarian was only steps away. Croy put one foot forward in a strong defensive crouch.
Morget came around the side of the rack, both hands filled with weaponry. Croy raised one arm to protect his face But it was no use. Both cylinders full of manure struck him square on, covering him instantly in filth.
“Oh, for fie,” Croy said, spluttering as wet manure slid down his cheeks and matted his hair. He jumped forward but Morget had already run away. As Croy came out into the main aisle between the racks, a steady rain of manure cylinders smashed all around him, knocking over r
acks, exploding on the wet floor until it was a slippery morass. Croy tried to return fire, snatching cylinder after cylinder off the rack, but he could barely sense where Morget hid.
A cylinder struck Croy’s shoulder and spun him around-but for a split second he’d seen Morget’s shaved head sticking up over a rack to his left. Croy ducked low, gathering a pair of cylinders up in his arms as he hurried forward. It was hard to keep his balance on the muck-covered floor, but just as Morget rose to throw again, Croy leapt forward, twisting in midair, and cast first one then the other cylinder, at very close range and with all the power of his arms.
The first cylinder missed Morget and burst against the wall behind him. The second, however, hit Morget squarely in the face. The red stain on his mouth and chin made an excellent target, even in the low light.
Manure splattered over Morget’s features, masking him in excrement. The barbarian tried to howl but only gurgled. He reached up with filthy hands to claw at his eyes, then dropped to his knees and coughed desperately to clear his mouth. For a while he could do nothing but grimace and spit.
Croy slapped him on the back and a thick ball of manure shot out of the barbarian’s windpipe. Morget gasped for breath and nodded his thanks. When he could breathe again, Croy reached down with one hand and grasped Morget’s wrist tightly, helping him to his feet.
The barbarian laughed and shook his head. “It is like the olden days, when my brother and I would wrestle and play tricks on one another,” he said.
“It’s good to have a laugh now and again,” Croy agreed. He sighed. “Ah, Morget, here we are-surrounded by death and danger, our comrades in certain peril, lost in the dark in the lair of a demon.”
The barbarian agreed with a hearty sigh. “What other treasures could life offer to a man?”
Croy’s eyes went wide. This was a… treasure? And yet… he knew exactly what Morget meant. Croy never felt so alive as when he was dodging certain annihilation, or cutting his way through a throng of enemies. As much as he wanted to rescue Cythera and Slag and get away from the Vincularium, there was a part of him that longed for adventures like this, and mourned how few of them fate presented to him.
“I’ll miss this life,” he said.
“You are expecting to die soon?” Morget asked.
“Only part of me.” Croy shook his head. “I fear the age of adventuring is coming to an end. My land is pacified, and from here to the mountains in every direction, it is turned to agriculture, and the good of mankind. All of Skrae is under the rule of the king’s law. No more trolls scheming in dark forests. No more bandits preying on travelers in the hills.” He laughed a little. “And every year, fewer sorcerers remain-the arcane arts are thankfully being lost. Now that Hazoth is dead, there are only two or three real sorcerers left in the world. And where there are no sorcerers, there can be no demons that need slaying.”
“It is true. Too true,” Morget agreed.
“Well, no point in crying over future boredom when today is full of excitement,” Croy said, brushing off his cloak as best he could. He would need to bathe before he saw Cythera again, or she would most likely faint from the smell of him. “We must press on.” He sniffed at the air. The stench of the manure didn’t bother him so much anymore-nor did it obscure other smells quite as much. He led Morget back to the central aisle, then started once more up the tunnel, looking for another way up.
He sniffed at the air again. Something-maybe-reached his nose that was not the smell of excrement, nor of mushrooms, nor of general damp. Something sharp and slightly acrid. Something that tickled the roof of his mouth.
Looking back at Morget, he placed a finger across his lips for silence. Then he drew Ghostcutter.
He had definitely smelled the smoke of a campfire.
Chapter Forty-seven
Croy and Morget moved forward silently, taking light steps to avoid splashing in the water that covered the floor. They both had their swords drawn but held low so they wouldn’t glimmer in the light.
There was definitely light ahead of them, far down the tunnel. They had extinguished their candles. Croy could see very little. But his eyes weren’t playing tricks on him-a flickering radiance came down the aisle, glinting on the wet floor.
He was unable to dispel a nagging thought. Nothing they’d seen so far required fire. Nothing they’d seen suggested there was a desire for warmth or light in this forgotten place. The fire might have been natural. The fungus they’d seen lining the walls of the central shaft might be flammable, and some strange alchemy of forgotten places might have started a blaze on its own. But he thought not-the fire was glowing too steadily, as if it had been tended with care. And a natural fire down here would have spread quickly, given enough fuel, while this fire seemed to be carefully contained.
Which left only one possible conclusion: they were not alone in the Vincularium.
He already knew that the demon haunted the place. He’d also seen the countless revenants up on the top level. He understood that the ancient city was not completely abandoned. Yet this fire suggested that things were far more complicated than he’d previously believed. The demon didn’t seem intelligent enough to use fire. The revenants were creatures of the cold and the dark-they had shunned Dawnbringer’s light, so why would they make a fire of their own? No, there must be living creatures here. Living people, who needed to stay warm.
He should have known earlier, he thought. The flock of beetles and then the farm of mushrooms should have spelled it out clearly. Farms did not prosper on their own. Someone had to be cultivating the fungus. If someone didn’t come by periodically to harvest the yield, the crop of mushrooms would have died and rotted long since.
He looked back at Morget and thought of how to proceed. There was no telling how many enemies might be waiting by that fire. Yet Croy knew he had to get through them. They’d found no other path toward the upper levels. If he wanted to go up, he had to go through whoever tended that fire. If he wanted to rescue Cythera and Slag, he needed to keep advancing.
The racks on either side provided excellent cover, but there was no way to move forward without heading up the center aisle. It was also their only path of retreat, should there be more resistance ahead than the two of them could handle.
“Do you see any other path but to charge forward?” he whispered to the barbarian.
“I’ve rarely needed any other,” the barbarian replied.
Croy nodded. He frowned and looked forward again. Shadows flowed along the ceiling, as if someone had moved around the fire. “Together we run up there, as fast as we can, and surprise them.”
Morget nodded. “As it should be.”
Croy shifted his grip on Ghostcutter’s hilt. Then he held up three fingers. Morget looked at them in incomprehension, then shrugged and ran forward, bellowing a war cry and brandishing Dawnbringer over his head.
For a second Croy watched the barbarian recede before him, aghast at how much noise Morget made. He supposed it was honorable to let your enemies know you were coming, but still Oh, enough, Croy thought. Then he screamed, “For Skrae and her king!” and followed the barbarian in his headlong rush up the tunnel.
Croy could see nothing but Morget’s back. His feet kept slipping on the wet floor and his breath plumed out before him in the damp. His brains felt like they were rattling in his skull as his boots came crashing down, again and again, on the hard flagstones.
He thought he must be running to certain death-at least, certain death for someone. The long tunnel sped past him, rack after rack of mushrooms in their ordure, and then suddenly the tunnel opened up, widening out into a broad antechamber.
Morget staggered to a stop. Croy saw the barbarian standing over a very small campfire, turning his head back and forth as he sought something. Croy drew up beside him and looked down to see buckets of water sitting by the fire. Nothing else.
“He disappeared before I could cut him down,” Morget said. He sounded like a gambler who had just discovered a
card cheat.
“He? Who did you see? I saw nothing,” Croy told the barbarian.
Morget frowned. “There was one person here. Small, perhaps a youth.”
“A warrior of some kind? Was he wearing armor?”
“No.”
“Was he armed?” Croy asked.
“I do not think so. I do not know if it was even a male. It might have been a girl. It was very small. Yes. Probably a girl, judging by the noise she made. She screeched a bit, then ran that way.” Morget pointed with Dawnbringer toward the wall of the tunnel. Croy saw no door there, not even a wide crack between the mortared bricks. “She simply vanished.”
“Cythera can do that,” Croy said, rubbing his chin. “She can make herself invisible, but only for a few moments at a time. You… you don’t think it was Cythera?”
Morget shook his head violently. “Definitely not. Cythera is bigger. You know, taller. And dresses in finer clothes. This girl wore only a much-patched shift.”
Croy stepped over to the wall. He pounded on the bricks with the pommel of his sword. The hollow thud he made suggested there was an open space behind the wall-but what of it? What kind of girl could just walk through a solid wall?
“Whoever she was, she’s gone now.” Croy shook his head. He glanced down at the buckets by the fire. “I don’t think she was a warrior at all.”
Morget turned to stare at him. “No. No. She was… very small.”
Croy stared back. Was Morget suffering a pang of conscience? If the girl had not fled, Croy was certain Morget would have cut her down just on principle. Maybe he was doubting his whole philosophy, maybe he was wondering why he had devoted his life to mindless violence, and “I have not killed anything in days,” Morget said. “Now, I am cheated!” He bellowed in rage at the unfairness of it all. “Magic! She must have used magic, to vanish in thin air like that. She must have been a sorceress. And I could not reach her in time.”
Croy frowned. He looked down at the buckets. They were simple, and crudely made from hammered sheets of tin. They leaked. “A witch, perhaps,” he admitted.
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