by T. H. Lain
She tossed the glowing pebble in her hand and caught it.
"I'll say."
The cave looked like someone had torn the roof off and revealed the noonday sun.
They saw Krusk's passages almost immediately. The stairs curved down into the circular room, then ended a little more than twenty feet from where the party stood. A dozen passages, each sealed with a gate of some sort, ringed the outside wall. As they moved down into the open area, each in turn saw that the floor was covered with thin slime. They poked it warily, first with Naull's quarterstaff, then the tip of a dagger. Finally, Regdar pinched some of the residue between his mail-covered fingers and sniffed it.
"Normal," Regdar said, "but slippery, I imagine."
The party moved into the room and fanned out. A heavy-looking portcullis barred each of the passages. Naull walked up to one.
"Look at this!" she exclaimed.
The effect of the daylight spell stopped a few inches beyond the iron bars.
"Krusk," she called, "come over here a minute."
The half-orc sloshed through the mud, and at Naull's direction, he squinted through the iron bars. As he came away, he shook his head.
"Can't see anything," he grunted.
Naull held the daylight pebble up to the bars and hesitated. With a piece of string, she tied the pebble to the end of her quarterstaff and extended it between the bars of the portcullis. The light in the cavern went out suddenly. Someone-Naull thought it was Alhandra-gasped. She pulled the staff back and the light returned.
"What did you do?" Regdar snapped. He'd been startled, too.
Naull explained, "It must be a darkness spell-and a powerful one. It looks like there's one in each of these passages."
They looked around and saw that it was true.
"What do we do, then? Which way do we go?" Alhandra asked.
They stood in silence for a few moments, Naull idly tossing the pebble in her hand again. Then she remembered Krusk's recitation. She turned to the half-orc, who seemed to be testing the bars of one portcullis.
"Krusk! The key-you said the key would show us the way. Pull it out!"
Krusk paused only for a moment, then pulled the key out from beneath his chain shirt. The disk glowed again as he revealed it to them. In the effect of the daylight spell they could all see that the flat, flame-decorated key gleamed brighter than before.
But other than that, it did nothing.
"Try walking in front of the doors," Regdar suggested.
Krusk looked at Naull, then at Alhandra, and did as Regdar said. He held the key in his large, open hand and walked slowly around room. The rest of the party followed him, watching carefully for any sign from the disk or the passages.
Nothing happened.
"Well, that was no help," Naull grumbled. She picked up her right foot and looked in disgust at the slime. "Anybody see anything on any of the doors?"
Each portcullis looked identical and unmarked to her. Naull moved to the center of the room so the rest of the party could see every portcullis at once. She grew bored as they searched, however, and started flipping the stone in the air like a coin. The shadows in the room bounced up and down.
Finally, Regdar had enough. Breaking off his search at the sixth door, he strode to the center of the room and grabbed Naull's wrist in mid-toss.
"Stop that!" he said, frustration in his voice. "You're giving me a headache."
The pebble dropped past Naull's hand and plopped into the slime covering the floor.
"Oh, great," Naull said irritably as she crouched to retrieve it. "That's just great, Regdar."
She picked at the slime with her hands. Though the light centered on the pebble, it didn't make it any easier to find when it was covered in muck. She ended up having to sweep whole sections of the floor clean with her hand.
"Yuck!" she complained, flipping grayish slime off her fingertips. "I should make you do this, you know," she said to Regdar. "At least you have gloves!"
The fighter stared at the floor. Without looking away, he called out, "Krusk! Alhandra! Get over here!"
He crouched and started pushing away the muck with both gauntleted hands. Slime splashed up into Naull's face and she recoiled, then slipped and fell onto the floor, the glowing pebble back in her hands.
"Hey!" she protested. Regdar shot her an apologetic look but kept on sweeping. "Hey!" Naull exclaimed again as she saw what he was doing. "Hey!" She got down on all fours and helped.
It took several minutes, but when it was over the four slime-soaked adventurers had cleared away a large section in the center of the circular room. The floor glistened damply, but with most of the slime gone, they could see what looked like a giant version of the key: A ball of flame emblazoned on the floor. The tail of the flame pointed quite distinctly at the third door from the stairs.
"Now that's more like it," Naull said, wiping her face with the back of her hand.
"But how do we open the door?" Alhandra asked.
As they looked from one to another, Naull had an idea.
"Krusk, stand in the center of the room," she said, "then pull out the key and orient it like the one on the floor."
The half-orc followed the first two directions, but balked at the third. Naull didn't understand what the problem was until Alhandra stepped up to him and moved the disk in his hand so that the tail pointed in exactly the same direction as the one on the floor.
"Right," Naull said, "now walk straight toward that door."
As Krusk stepped across the room, Naull thought she saw a faint light coming from beyond the portcullis. She and the rest of the party followed Krusk. As they neared the passage, they heard a faint creaking sound. Slowly, the portcullis rose. Beyond it, they saw a stone-lined passage, wide enough for all of them to walk abreast, lit by torches that had somehow sprung to life.
"I guess that's the way," Naull said.
They stepped inside.
A few miles away, up and to the east, other feet stepped inside a cave.
"Are you certain they came up here?" Grawltak growled fiercely.
The scout nodded. They had followed the soft-skins' trail from south of the village and only stopped once for a short rest. His gnolls were tired, but their noses still worked. They'd found the horses only a few hundred feet away. They slew the dark one, but the gray bolted farther into the canyon when they'd approached it.
The gnoll pack butchered the fallen horse and took as much meat as they could carry. They were messy and loud about it, but Grawltak let them enjoy themselves while he considered his next move. He pushed them hard, and would push them harder. If the soft-skins went underground, then they must be following the map his mistress said the half-orc possessed. He needed to keep pressing them, to catch them if possible. Horse blood would have to do for sleep and fresh-killed meat would have to do for rest.
Grawltak himself could not enjoy it. He needed to check in with his leader. Crouching down on all fours, he pulled out the disk and set it on a rock. He chanted until it glowed to life.
"Mistress…" he said.
The red face answered.
The Gate
The hall continued straight as far as they could see. Every twenty feet a new pair of torch sconces were mounted on the wall, and each flared to life as the adventurers approached. Four pairs of torches lit when they stepped into the hall, and there seemed to be no end of them as they walked down the silent passage.
"Magic," Krusk said. He still held the key in his open hand and its flames flickered brightly.
"You think?" Naull observed dryly, but her nervous sarcasm was lost on the half-orc.
As the party continued on, they noticed the torches behind them didn't dim after they passed. The portcullis, it seemed, remained open as well.
"Do you think we should go back and close it?" Naull asked Regdar. The opening seemed small and far away, but it was clear in the light.
He shook his head. "No. If we need to get out of here in a hurry, I don't wan
t to try to figure out how to open it from this side. Besides, do you know how to shut it?"
Naull shook her head.
"Then let's keep moving."
The passage continued for several hundred feet. It stayed straight and level, and the width never varied. Reddish flagstones covered the floor, large enough that only two and a half were needed from wall to wall. The walls appeared to be made of burnished sandstone, but they were smooth to the touch and not porous at all. The ceiling, which was rounded and stood at its highest point nearly thirty feet from the floor, was darkly colored but had shades of red as well. They saw no dust or dirt anywhere.
"This is just creepy," Naull said at last. Regdar nodded. "I mean, we've been in some pretty nasty goblin tunnels, and that passage down here was nowhere I'd like to stay for any length of time, but this is so, so regular. I've never seen anything like it."
"Dwarf-make," Krusk said, but he didn't sound certain.
"I don't know, Krusk," Regdar answered. "I mean, dwarves are pretty good with stone and all, but even their work fades after centuries. I don't want you to bite my head off-" the fighter turned to Naull-"but do you want to check for magic?"
The wizard shook her head. "I don't," she said. "I mean, I'm sure the torches are magical, but they could really just be a triggered version of a continual flame spell. That's no big deal. Whatever magic keeps these passages intact and completely clean after all these years…" She shook her head. "I've heard stories of powerful magic blowing the backs of wizards' heads off when they try detecting it. I'll be perfectly happy if nothing like that ever happens to me. Let's just say I cast my spell and determined that, yes, this whole place is magic, all right?"
Regdar smiled at Naull's speech, and she grinned back, feeling a little better. Another pair of torches flared to life.
Alhandra, who was walking a little ahead of the party pointed with her sword and called out softly, "Did you say 'clean,' Naull?"
The others hurried up. About eighty feet ahead, just at the farthest edge of the torchlight, the party saw that the passage opened up. It looked like it might be a room, hut they couldn't see beyond the reach of the torches. Just where the hall widened lay what looked for all the world like bundles of ripped or discarded cloth. Clothing, perhaps, and other bits of gear.
Regdar drew his sword from its back sheath. Krusk, like Alhandra, already had his weapon in his hands.
"A trap?" Naull asked.
"Maybe," the fighter answered. "Could be what's left of the last people who came down here."
Naull looked over at Krusk, who tucked the key into his chain shirt.
"But nobody's been down here for centuries," she said. "They couldn't get here without the key."
"Maybe there are other keys," Regdar answered uncertainly.
"Whatever it is, we aren't going to find out much from here," the wizard stated finally. She started walking forward.
With a sharp exclamation of alarm, Regdar jumped forward.
"No-wait here," he said. "I'll check it out."
"I've seen how you find traps, Regdar," she said, mimicking him striding forward and looking oblivious. She jerked up short, flailing her arms and overbalancing as if her foot was caught in a noose. "Look! A trap!"
"Very funny, but that bit of cloth isn't going to protect you if something shoots out of the wall," he said, jabbing Naull high in her sternum.
"Well… let Krusk come with me. He's good at spotting things, and I can try to find any magic."
"What about getting your head blown off by arcane forces?"
"I'll chance it," she said. She crooked a finger at the barbarian, who shuffled forward. "C'mon. Let's see what there is to see."
Despite her jaunty attitude, Naull felt her stomach churning as she and Krusk moved toward the open area. Regdar and Alhandra followed them until the torches in the room-four of them, spaced evenly around the walls-flared to life. The room looked to be about thirty feet in diameter, and a door stood at the far end.
On the floor they saw several piles of ragged clothes, bits of old adventuring gear, and even a few glittering gems. Naull easily resisted the urge to jump forward and examine them. It wasn't the time to be greedy. In fact, their presence made Regdar's guess about the trap seem even more likely.
Although, she wondered, if people died here, where are the bodies?
"Anything about a door in that memory of yours, Krusk?" she asked in a low voice.
The barbarian paused again, and his lips started to move. He had to run through the litany front to back.
"… a door at the edge of magic," he began aloud finally, "the key will come to life. Open the door to see the light and reveal the gate."
Quickly, Naull shuffled through the papers in the packet. She looked into the room-they still stood twenty or so feet from the entrance-and at the door. She saw an image of flame graven into the stone door. It looked similar to the image of the key, but not exactly the same. However, to the right of the door, at about waist height, she saw what looked very much like a keyhole.
"Yes!" the wizard cried out. "This is it!"
She stuffed the papers into her pouch and stepped forward into the room. As she stepped past the first pile of debris, the rags on the floor sprang to life. Krusk cried out in warning, but he was too late.
The gnolls wrinkled their noses as they picked their way down the passage. As trackers, they welcomed the advantage a strong scent afforded, but these smells from below ground were unfamiliar and unsettling to the scouts.
"Keep moving!" Grawltack ordered, cuffing the nearest scout. "Follow the trail."
The younger gnolls jogged ahead of him, but Kark held back. The two older gnolls followed, keeping out of earshot of the rest.
"What did she say, Grawltak?" Kark asked in a low voice.
The pack-master cursed and clutched the magic amulet, as if by doing so he could keep his mistress from hearing.
"She was not pleased. I do not think she expected the half-orc to lead them to the caves so quickly."
"How could she think otherwise?" Kark snuffled disrespectfully. "She didn't know where the passage was. She didn't even tell us we were looking for a passage!"
Grawltak thought of reprimanding the old gnoll for his candid comment, but sighed tiredly. "She has not told us other things, either. She insists that we follow and that she will find us before we must enter…" he hesitated.
The mistress had been very clear in her instructions. "Do not tell your followers this, Grawltak," she had said. "Follow the half-orc to a city-a magic city, with great treasure in it. Stop the half-orc from entering, or you enter yourself and slay him and all with him."
She said other things, too, things he needed to consider carefully before going much farther, but he continued, "We must enter a passage. The passage leads to a gate, which leads to a city." He shot a look of warning at Kark, and the older gnoll understood and nodded. "I cannot tell you more, but if we do not catch the half-orc and his friends, we'll have to go into the city and… and that's something I do not wish to do."
He growled, deep in his throat. Gnolls seldom admitted to fear, and never to their subordinates, but Grawltak was tired and Kark was his friend.
The old gnoll nodded and asked, "And she will find us?"
"She will, curse-curse the half-orc," he amended. He nearly tore the amulet off his chest. "I'm not sure I want a reward anymore, Kark. The mistress drives us, and I do not think we will gain a reward anyway. I would rather go back to the north and raid."
Kark chuckled and let out a soft howl of laughter. Despite himself, Grawltak found himself chuckling, too.
"Would that we could!" Kark said. "But we must hunt our quarry and kill it. Only when the half-orc's blood stains our fangs and we tear out the throats of his friends will we be free again!" He clapped his leader on the back. "Come, my captain, let us join the hunt before the young ones run into trouble."
Grawltak grinned and the two set off down the passage.
; A strip of dirty cloth leaped up at Naull from the floor. She started in surprise and moved her fingers, but the band wrapped around her hands and arms tightly. She tried to cry out, but another strip whipped at her face and drew blood. When she opened her mouth, rough leather gagged her. Eyes widening in panic, she tried to pull away.
Krusk hacked at the cloth, yelling his war cry. He narrowly missed hitting Naull as she felt herself jerked back and forth by the animated cloth. As the tatters and bands of leather and fabric wrapped around her, she felt herself spun this way and that.
From the corner of one eye she saw the other bits of ripped clothing fly up off the floor. They formed roughly humanoid shapes. Bits of gems and metal peeked out from behind the tatters, and the shapes jerked as if manipulated by a puppeteer's strings.
One of the shapes leaped, or flew, or in some other way moved toward Krusk. He still tried to find a way to strike the fabric grappling Naull and the shape caught him from behind. The half-orc cried out as strips of cloth and leather bound his mighty legs. Dropping his axe, the half-orc wrestled with the tattered form.
Then something struck Naull-from inside. Something that felt like a ragged but powerful consciousness tried to envelope her mind even as it covered her body. She tried to scream again, forgetting the leather bonds around her mouth, then she fell back on her training.
Concentrate… concentrate, she thought.
In an instant, she felt the consciousness repelled. It could not control her as long as she maintained her focus.
So the fabric started squeezing her.
Alhandra and Regdar rushed forward as they saw the cloth snake out and grab Naull. They reached the room as it completely covered her and as Krusk dropped his weapon. Regdar shifted his bastard sword to his left hand and drew a knife. He tried cutting at Naull's bonds but succeeded at slicing both the fabric and the wizard underneath. With a cry of dismay he hardened himself and hacked again. The fabric shuddered and Naull's blood flowed, but the creature was shifting to avoid the blade and that meant it was releasing the wizard. Naull gasped as air came back into her body.