“Which you weren’t answering,” Roeglin finished for him.
“No,” Gustav replied. He managed a small smile. “I was being very uncooperative.”
“For that, we’re grateful,” Roeglin told him, “and we’re glad to have you back.”
“It is a threat you will need to deal with,” Gustav told him. “I got the impression that those taken Below weren’t just left in a pit, but were given to something.”
“Maybe Evan or Xavier can tell us more,” Marsh suggested.
“Agreed,” Roeglin said, and his eyes flashed white. When he had summoned them, he looked around the table.
“I know we could find out just by going and looking to see what’s down there,” he admitted, “but I’d like to get an idea of what we’re looking for before we go back in.”
Evan and Xavier came at the trot and gave Roeglin a worried look when they arrived.
“What do you need?” Evan asked.
“Take a seat,” the shadow mage told them. “I need to pick your brains.”
“You need a particular memory?” Evan asked, “Or do you just want to rummage around in there?”
Roeglin’s jaw dropped, and he stared at the man in shock. “I beg your pardon?”
“Do you need me to remember anything in specific, or do you want to go looking for what you need?” Evan repeated.
“I just wanted to ask you a question,” Roeglin told him, “but I guess I could go rummaging around in your head.”
Xavier gave a false shudder. “Ugh. I wouldn’t, boss. You don’t know what you’ll step in inside there. Rummaging would be a pretty risky business if you ask me.”
Evan elbowed him. “He speaks for himself, but seriously, Roeglin, what do you need to know?”
“What did it mean when someone was taken Below? Were they taken to a specific location? Handed to another batch of raiders? Fed to a monster? What?”
Evan looked at Xavier, and the man shrugged.
“To be honest,” he replied, “neither of us knows what you found under the ruins. I mean, we know there were dungeons and they kept prisoners there.”
“And tortured them,” Xavier added, folding his arms across his chest. His eyes momentarily took on a faraway look. It ended when he shook himself and focused his gaze on Roeglin. “We didn’t know.”
“The screams didn’t bother you?” The comment was out before Marsh could stop it, and she immediately regretted it.
Evan gave her a wounded look. “There was a lot that bothered us,” he answered softly, “and not a lot that we could do to stop it, but we never heard a thing coming out of the Library. The dungeons were a fair way inside, and the doors were thick.”
“I understand,” Marsh told him, red-faced. She regretted her words. “I’m sorry.”
He gave her a grimace. “It’s okay. All we know is that the Below is under the Library, and the only entrance to it is inside.”
“That and we were asked to bring prisoners to the chief’s office and leave them there,” Xavier elaborated.
“Especially mages,” Evan added. “Anyone who showed an iota of magical talent was to be brought.”
His eyes grew wide and his expression haunted. “I hid everyone I could.”
Xavier nodded in agreement. “You gave me the courage to do the same. Until I saw you hide that druid, I just tried not to see. After that, I tried to keep them safe as well. It was hard.”
Tok hissed and the other mantids drew back, rising on their hind legs and curling their antennae in distress.
Evan snorted. “You know it’s rude to look without asking permission, right?”
Tok’s antennae quirked.
The matter is important for us to understand. Your kind has done no worse than some of our people, and you did much better than many. I can see why you were forgiven and what constraints we must consider if we are ever able to return to our world.
Marsh didn’t know what to think of that, so she shrugged. “Is there anyone left who might know more?”
Evan shook his head. “No. They all fought, and some were trying to kill the prisoners when you reached them. You showed them the only kind of mercy they deserved.”
Marsh remembered some of the fighting she’d seen and some of the men she’d killed.
“If I’d known, I’d have tried to take a few alive.”
“Wouldn’t have done you any good,” Roeglin told her. “I’d have killed the ones you left.”
She looked at him in surprise, and he gave her a guilty shrug.
“What can I say? I lost my temper.”
Xavier’s quiet voice broke in. “The guards from the dungeons used to laugh about what happened down there,” he murmured. “They’d come off a shift, talking about what they’d done, or what they were planning to do.”
He shuddered. “It was always worse to hear when they came out after taking people Below. I asked them once what happened to the prisoners they took Below, and they asked me why, did I want to find out for myself?”
He paused and swallowed hard, then continued. “One told me it was better I didn’t find out for myself, and another offered to help me learn firsthand. A third just said they left the prisoners in a place called the Arena and closed the doors. He said they didn’t go back until the screaming stopped and the place had stayed quiet for two turns of an hourglass.”
“So how did they know when it was time to make a delivery?” Roeglin asked. “Was it on a regular schedule, or was there something else?”
“Something else,” Evan told him. “The boss would get a message. We never saw the messages or what they were written on, but he got them, and he’d call a special assembly. He’d ask those of us on the surface to turn in anyone who’d shown magical ability, and then he’d take a stroll through the pens to find anyone else the Others might want.”
“Others?” Marsh latched onto the title. “Who were they?”
“No one knows. We just called them that because we figured they weren’t us.” He shrugged. “We never imagined that they might come from another world entirely.”
“How did the boss choose?” Roeglin asked. He gestured at Gustav. “After all, it’s not like Gustav is very magical.”
“No, but he did fight them, and that was more than enough to make him a candidate for the dungeons and a gift for the Others.”
Marsh remembered the condition the soldier had been in when she’d arrived. “You would have thought they’d have kept him in better condition,” she mused, but Xavier shook his head.
“The injured ones showed the Others our ‘strength’ or something like that. That’s as much as I could get from the guards when I asked them the same question. One of the others said I should ask the boss.”
He shuddered. “No way that was happening.”
“Not that any of us asked him much,” Evan added, and Xavier nodded.
“Yeah, he always looked sick until it was done.”
“Sick? How do you mean?” Marsh was having difficulty imagining anything that would make Kearick sick unless it was a loss of profit.
“Well, he was always a bit pale after a message came through,” Xavier told them.
“And sweaty,” Evan added.
“Pale and sweaty and jumpy,” Xavier elaborated. “The slightest noise would make him start. It was like he thought something was watching him from the shadows or waiting to leap out at him.”
“And talk about a temper!” Evan exclaimed. “I mean, he was mean most days, but until a delivery Below had gone off successfully, he was worse. The slightest infringement could set him off, and it didn’t matter who you were. You could be sentenced to a night staked out for the remnant, or a stint in the dungeons, or a public beating by the guards. It all depended on what crossed his mind at the time.”
Marsh shivered. That was not a side of Kearick she’d ever seen. Sure, he’d shouted when he was upset, but he’d never meted out physical punishment, and she could not imagine the Kearick she knew ever feedi
ng someone to the shadows.
“It took him a couple of days to settle down. We all avoided him until he got over it. It was the only thing we could do.”
“Apart from the guards that waited outside, did anyone go in with the prisoners and talk about it?” Roeglin asked.
Evan and Xavier exchanged glances.
“No one went into the Arena that we ever heard about,” Xavier told him, “and believe me, I asked.”
Evan frowned. “Gustav was down there for one delivery.” He glanced at the guard captain. “Ask him.”
Gustav shook his head. “I was down there, sure, but they kept the doors closed and locked as if something might get in.”
He paled. “It didn’t keep the sound out, though. They reminded me of it when they came back. Said that was what was waiting for me next time someone was needed Below.”
He fell silent, staring across the table at nothing. The memories scrolling behind his eyes were not something Marsh wanted him to share. They waited until he blinked and came back to the present.
“If you’re going down there, I’m coming, too.”
“Going where?” Marsh asked, doing her best impression of Aisha trying to look innocent.
It had the desired effect, and Gustav chuckled.
“The Arena, or whatever Evan called it. You’re going to go there and then look for the portal.” He leaned back in his chair and surveyed them both. “I’m going, too.”
Marsh exchanged glances with Roeglin and Master Envermet, and Tok’s eyestalks waved as he studied each of them.
“Me, too!” Aisha declared.
Tamlin sighed, and the little girl glared at him. He raised his hands. “I’m not going to stop you.”
“You’re not?” she asked, her small face comical in surprise.
“Nope, but I am coming with you to make sure you don’t get into trouble, okay?”
She frowned, considering it. “’Kaaaay.”
Master Envermet rolled his eyes and pushed back his chair. “If that’s decided, do we have anything else we need to discuss?”
They looked at each other and shrugged.
“I can’t think of anything else,” Marsh told them, standing.
She glanced at Roeglin, directing their attention toward him. He was the leader of the township, after all.
Roeglin followed her example and stood. “I’ll meet you all at the Library as soon as you are ready. It’s time we took a proper look at what is down there.”
Tok clicked a question. Where would you like us to wait?
“You’re all coming?”
As well as being among my most powerful minds, these are also my advisors. We need to assess the location.
“And you’re already familiar with portals,” Roeglin concluded.
He led them outside and pointed at the Library. “Meet us at the main doors. We will not take long to prepare, but...”
But you need your armor and extra weapons, the mantid concluded for him.
“We do.”
And the child?
“She has defenses of her own.”
And defenders, the mantid noted, flicking an antenna toward Tamlin and then to where Mordan, her kits, and Scruffknuckle were emerging from around the corner of a building.
The kat flicked her ears toward the mantid and then flicked her tail, her gaze scanning the gathered mages and guards. When she found Aisha, she padded solemnly over to the child and circled around her.
Aisha giggled and then hugged her. The kat gave a long-suffering sigh and looked at Roeglin.
“I think she wants you to hurry,” Gustav observed, and the others laughed.
“Then we’d all better hurry,” Master Envermet suggested, and they made for their quarters at a jog.
Tok watched them go and then leaned down to the kat.
Is she still safe?
Mordan looked up at the insectoid’s face and blinked at him. Of course, my human is safe.
And then she yawned, showing the mantid her fangs.
The other mantids chittered nervously, but Tok merely inclined his head in acknowledgment and then straightened. We will wait.
It did not take long for the humans to return. Tok looked them over, silently approving of the armor they wore. He eyed their weapons and gave an internal shrug. The shadow mages would not use them, preferring to take their weapons from the air around them—and the one who used fire to coat his sword would soon ruin its temper.
“It’s this way,” Roeglin told him, unaware of his internal thoughts. Tok was aware of being studied. “The entrance will be a tight squeeze for you.”
Dipping into the human’s mind, Tok saw what he meant, but he also saw little choice.
He and his people needed to see the site of the portal, and they had no alternative means of reaching it. When they had escaped through it, none of them had intended to go back, and their flight had been too rushed for any to remember what path they had taken.
15
The Delivery Point
The Library had been cleaned since Marsh’s last visit. Even so, she could still see the faint shadows of bloodstains on the floor and some of the walls. She followed Roeglin through the door, and the sight made her pause.
Roeglin continued on a few steps, then turned back.
Are you okay?
Marsh nodded, looking around. To her left, she could see the large desk the children had hidden under. It had been pulled out from the wall, and benches had been added so more people could sit around it. The late afternoon sunshine created a pool of light and warmth on the wall behind it, but not on the table, and the bookcases had been rearranged so that it now sat in a space of its own.
“I like it,” Marsh told him. “It’s…”
She shrugged. “We need to keep moving.”
Without waiting for him to reply, she led the way to where she remembered the stairs started. Roeglin followed, letting her absorb the other changes around her.
For one thing, everything was tidy—the books had been reshelved and overturned furniture righted. What concerned her most, however, was the locked door leading to the small room above the stairwell. The raiders had used it as a secure checkpoint, but it was empty now.
Marsh moved aside so Roeglin could unbolt the door and found herself pushed farther away as Mordan shouldered her way past. She opened her mouth to protest, only to close it again when the cat fixed her with a defiant stare.
“Well, of course, after you, Dan,” she answered. “As if I’d get in your way.”
The kat tossed her head and gave an irritable twitch of her tail but didn’t do more. Marsh got the message loud and clear, though, and was tempted to forge ahead of the cat to make a point.
As she thought it, Mordan tensed, and Marsh decided against pushing her. When Perdemor tried to follow his mother, however, she drew the line.
“Don’t even think about it,” she snapped, and the kit hesitated.
When he raised his head in defiance, Marsh let the shadows shudder around her, and the kit stepped back. Roeglin opened the door and went to do the same for the next one.
“Nothing’s been disturbed,” he reported, “and the guards say they’ve heard nothing the whole time they’ve been on duty.”
“No one’s been through since I left?” Marsh asked.
“No, we wanted to wait until everyone was back and we’d had time to discuss what to do.”
The bolt gave, and he slid it back. As soon as he started opening the door, Mordan slipped past him into the darkness beyond. Marsh stumbled as Perdemor and his siblings followed. Behind her, she heard Aisha pat Scruffknuckle.
“Go on,” the child ordered. “Go with them. I’ll be fine. I will look after Marsh.”
Marsh smothered a smile and followed Roeglin and the kat down the stairs.
The air felt stuffy and close, and she wrinkled her nose at the lingering scent of long imprisonment and hardship.
“We didn’t get to clean down here,” Roeglin i
nformed her.
She nodded in reply, letting her eyes adjust to the dark. This time they moved more slowly, inspecting each cell with care and looking for more than the survivors they’d been focused on last time. They found nothing, apart from what they had left behind.
Marsh glanced back at Gustav. “Are you okay?”
His face was pale and his eyes wide, but he nodded. Marsh noticed that his hands rested close to his weapons as his gaze roved the blackness.
She nudged Roeglin. “I’ll scout ahead.”
He opened his mouth as if to protest, then closed it again, giving her a nod. “Let me know what you find.”
Marsh didn’t dignify the instruction with a response but stepped past him, becoming one with the shadows as she did.
I am never getting used to that, he told her and let her see herself as he saw her.
The image made her shudder, and she had to fight to stay blended.
She looked like a ghost, a slightly darker shadow in the midst of shadows. Not quite there, but very real nonetheless. Her eyes gleamed, blacker than the rest of her, glittering like wet marble. With one last look at Roeglin, she trotted through the shadows and down the corridor, checking every cell and alcove and peering into every guard station.
Not only was the Under-Library complex empty, but it felt abandoned. The echo of footsteps moving in her wake did little to dispel that notion. Marsh worked her way through the cells until she reached the bare wall opposite the room that had held Kearick.
There she stopped. It was impossible to know what lay beyond the door. To fill the time, Marsh ran her fingers over the area she’d seen Roeglin touch until she found the hollows. She had decided not to try to operate it when he arrived.
“Waiting for us?” he asked, eyebrows raised.
“Thinking about it,” she replied, and he smiled.
I can see what’s going on inside your head, you know.
That’s rude, she told him, smiling back.
Aisha groaned, and they both turned to her.
“You’re not supposed to be looking, either,” Marsh told her.
Tamlin wormed his way to the front. “Are we going through or not?”
Magic Below Paris Complete Series Boxed Set (Books 1 - 8): Trading Into Shadow, Trading Into Darkness, Trading Close to Light, Trading By Firelight, Trading by Shroomlight, plus 3 more Page 177