Smart Alec in the Dark Lands

by Donald Wigboldy

  Alec nodded at his explanation, but again there felt like something was wrong and yet he couldn't put a finger on it. Of course Nadron's face was alien to the human boy, but Alec didn't see any deception in his eyes.

  He glanced to Helios whose aggressive stance had eased even more, Alec wondered if the dragaoin's earlier suspicions were merely rubbing off on him. If Helios believed the other wizard now, then maybe he should just let it go. Shaelamee didn't seem concerned either after all.

  "So Ediyem never showed to fight for the keep?" Helios repeated the bronze wizard's words from earlier in his story.

  "Never," Nadron replied. "I wonder why that woman wouldn't show herself? She is supposed to be in charge after all. If her superiors on Cenestraya ever found out about her shirking her duty..."

  Shaelamee frowned and added, "That doesn't sound like her though. Alec," she turned to the boy and asked, "do you see Ediyem's aura at all?"

  Again the young wizard did his best to look through walls and the ceiling searching for any other magic.

  "I don't see anything. Either she is too far away or she isn't on this floor or above us. If we went downstairs, is there a cellar or something below the first floor where she might have gone to hide?"

  Shaelamee slapped her forehead. "The cellar, it would be a good place to hide actually. There is only one stairway down and it is in the back. If the hollows didn't search thoroughly, someone could make it down there from the kitchen and never be found."

  "We'll all stick together and search the top floor," Helios stated including Nadron in his gaze which took in the others equally.

  "You're in charge now, Noface?" Nadron asked with a slight frown.

  "This is my team. You can join us or keep hiding here. If this keep has been compromised though, we are going to need to leave and try to make it to one of the other forts. They'll need to be warned."

  "Warned of what exactly?" the bronze dragaoin questioned curiously.

  "That there are Zmaj wizards who have joined with the hollows and that the hollows seem to be evolving. I don't know if it is their magic making them more intelligent or if it is happening naturally, but either way they are more dangerous than they have ever been and they are working with wizards," Helios warned his fellow wizard.

  Not bothering to argue further, Nadron joined the three as they continued to search for the missing commander.

  "So the hollows have joined Zmaj wizards? How could that happen?" the bronze wizard asked Helios.

  Shrugging as he led the way upstairs after checking the remainder of the second floor, Helios replied, "The wizards didn't say. The one I spoke to briefly tried to invite me to join them, but he only said that they were basically trying to shepherd them. I think that he was trying to protect them as well, though the wizards also seemed more than willing to let them be killed as they tried to kill us.

  "It was interesting speaking him."

  "Interesting how?"

  "Well, this wizard... what was his name? Oh, yes, Cursule I believe he said." Helios looked at Nadron and added, "He was a red chromatic wizard. We were also attacked by more chromats in the jungle on the way back. Do you think that just their kind have joined the hollows... Haileni, they call them as if that makes them something else? You don't think our metallic brethren have joined these crazy wizards in protecting the undead, do you?"

  Nadron didn't answer right away as they reached the third floor where Ediyem's office was. Looking inside, the room looked ransacked. Papers were strewn everywhere and her desk had been tossed aside. There were flame marks on the walls and a few other permanent scars left by magic. Alec could even see the remnants of magic in the wounds in the stone with his aura sense. It also helped him to know what he would have to look for to find Ediyem's aura. Magic use was almost like fingerprints to his aura vision.

  "The window's broken," Shaelamee said pointing to the opening. Glass was on the floor mixed in with the rest of the destruction. "That must be why she didn't join the fight. They flew in and grabbed her."

  "But why did they take her?" Alec asked. "They killed everyone they could find or tried to anyway, but Ediyem they made certain to grab. What could they get from taking her alive?"

  Surprisingly it was Nadron who said, "The commander of the keep is the key to the storm gate and has knowledge of the different worlds the Ciemnosci control. With enough information, they could reopen the gates and send an army or use her to seal the gate permanently otherwise, I suppose."

  The last words were added less like the dragaoin was guessing at what he said, in Alec's mind. Again he wondered if he was just simply seeing something in it that was merely influenced by Helios' dislike of the other dragaoin. While the silver sorcerer hadn't come out and said that he hated Nadron, enough had been said along the way that made the boy assume that they weren't exactly friends either.

  "We should check the gate room also then," Helios stated. "If Ediyem has been taken and everyone else but Nadron is dead, then we need to secure or destroy the gate before the Haileni can use it anyway."

  Nadron frowned and asked, "You plan to destroy it? If we can get access with the correct codes, we could leave here and warn the proper authorities, right?"

  Looking at the bronze dragaoin, Helios asked, "Has Ediyem never entrusted the box to you, Nadron? You are a wizard in good stead. Can't you use the gate?"

  "You know that the Ciemnosci don't teach anyone how to use the gates," Nadron said with a frown. "That is the only reason that Ediyem was stationed here. They need a dark elf in any fortress with a gate room in order to use it."

  Helios led the way down each floor until they were back to the first. Taking the proper turns and ways to get to the kitchen, Alec was left wondering where this gate room could be. They had covered most of the castle above ground and he hadn't seen any sign of it yet. Since they couldn't use it without Ediyem, he supposed that it didn't matter whether they destroyed it or not. It wouldn't get him home.

  Pressing on what looked like a smooth wall to Alec's eyes; Helios must have triggered a hidden pressure plate which made the seams of a door suddenly appear in the stone wall. It swung away from them revealing another stairway. The silver dragaoin led the way with Nadron right behind him.

  Shaelamee placed her hand in front of the boy a moment to let the bigger men lead the way. Her green eyes lifted to his still looking worried. They flicked to the bronze dragaoin's back as he followed behind Helios before returning to him. A small shake of her head let him know that the girl must be thinking the same things as he.

  Unable to speak without Nadron hearing, they followed Helios. Alec hoped that the silver dragaoin hadn't completely dismissed the bronze as being possibly in on the plan to attack the keep. If all the Zmaj along the way that had insinuated a traitor among those guarding Naermere weren't just lying to make them feel this way, they were running out of possibilities. Again, the boy only hoped that he was wrong. Nadron had said nothing and done nothing to give him that impression and yet he couldn't shake the feeling that something was wrong.

  The stairway circled turning and turning as they descended. Making more than a few circles before bringing them down about thirty feet. The small group found another door. It was sealed, but Helios pressed another hidden square making this one open as well.

  Alec heard the upper door suddenly close behind them with a thud.

  "Is it supposed to do that?" he asked.

  Shaelamee nodded and replied as the two dragaoin entered ahead of them. "When the lower doorway opens, the other closes to keep it hidden just in case. There is a special way to keep it open, of course, and we can leave using another plate at the top of the stairs; but we don't want to risk having more hollows show up to pursue us down here, do we?"

  The thought of being trapped under the keep with no way out and dozens of hollows between them and the surface was enough to make the boy want to shudder.

  Another large room full of boxes, sacks and bottles, both sitting on the ground
or placed in floor to ceiling shelving, was presented to the boy as he stepped through the lower doorway. This was where the supplies to maintain the guardians of the keep were stored. He guessed that even if the building was filled to capacity with staff, the room probably could hold enough for a few months' siege. Crewed with ten or less, that time frame was a lot longer.

  Helios walked across the room and touched one of the shelving units. It swung away from the wall and the dragaoin touched another hidden marker that created a new doorway in solid looking stone. More supplies including armor and weapons were in this room, but the dragaoin continued to the far side once again.

  Magic was summoned to surround the dragaoin's hand before Helios placed it against another solid looking wall. Runes appeared spreading outward from the sorcerer's hand until a large rectangle appeared and the stone simply disappeared from sight. There was no moving door this time. The wall became a large open square with a view of another room.

  Alec suddenly realized that, in spite of being below ground, each room had been lit. There were no obvious torches or lights, but the rooms were lit as if several chandeliers were in each. Knowing magic when he saw it and having no better explanation, the boy brought his attention to a single strange looking box with a cable run to a line of metal sitting on the floor in the middle of the room.

  "It is safe," Nadron stated. "I doubt that anyone else could get in here, Helios. In fact, I didn't know that anyone aside from Ediyem could open the doorway. When did she entrust it to you?"

  The silver scaled sorcerer looked at the dragaoin that he had known since childhood and said, "Why did she never entrust it to you, Nadron?"

  Waving off the question as if it was silly to even ask, the bronze wizard replied, "I have only been here four years. I guess that you having been here longer, you earned the dark elf's trust."

  "Perhaps." The blue eyes never left the other's face and Alec glanced between the two men curiously. "You know one thing bothers me."

  Even though the dragaoin faces were harder for him to read, Alec could see the confusion in Nadron as his forehead wrinkled like any human's might. "There is only one thing that bothers you, my friend? This whole day bothers me. If you hadn't noticed, the keep has fallen and we are now hiding in the cellar."

  "Well, one thing above all at the moment; how did the Zmaj know which room was Ediyem's office? They broke through the window bypassing all of the keep's defenses. If she was their only priority, then why all the ruckus to break into the keep from below?"

  Shrugging at him, Nadron replied, "Well, if they had been watching for awhile, then maybe they had seen the elf at her window in the past. They could make an educated guess where the commander would be."

  Helios turned his back on the others seemingly looking at the box and the apparatus attached to it. He said, "If that was the only thing, I would probably believe that was true. It would be unlikely, however, since those windows are treated with magic to make it appear like there is never anyone inside. Ediyem casts the spell on it every time that she opens her door. A commander is an obvious, valuable target to an enemy, so she always did what she could to avoid being obvious. With so many other unused rooms on that floor, it is surprising that the Haileni were able to see through her illusion so completely."

  "Well..." Nadron began, "I didn't realize that she used such an illusion. That is... interesting. You said that isn't the only thing that bothers you about it. What else could you mean?"

  Alec noted that strange graying of Helios' scales and wondered why he would cast it on himself now. Looking to Nadron, there didn't seem to be any obvious threat coming from the wizard.

  "When Cursule spoke to me, he called me the 'son of dragons'. The other Zmaj, when we fought them, said the same thing. I figured that someone who knew me had most likely spoken with them. Only someone who knew me well or long enough would know of the claim."

  "Many dragaoin claim the same, especially those of us with magic inherent to our being."

  "Us? Do you claim to draw your power from dragon lineage too, Nadron? I believe that you always said it was your study of magic, your mind that had tamed the power. You draw it from within or from the world without, but you need to study to learn new spells. You can't just create them because they are a part of you."

  The bronze wizard frowned and retorted, "It doesn't make me any less a son of dragons, does it? We both have magical power. We just get to it in different ways. Are you trying to insult me now?"

  Turning to face Nadron, the blue eyes held steadily on his dragon like face. Unlike Helios, the bronze snout and jaw stuck out. Alec could believe that Nadron was descended from dragons, while the boy could almost believe that Helios was a man covered in scales or armor. Only his sharp, pointed teeth made the sorcerer look particularly animalistic.

  "No one has called me son of dragons in Naermere. Only you knew me when we were children and teenagers when I found my power."

  Nadron's eyes narrowed.

  "Why would Cursule know me both by name and by that title unless someone told him? Even if he read my mind, I haven't considered the idea since I was a child.

  "Now someone who refers to me regularly as Noface and other slurs, he might remember that title and let it slip to another Zmaj."

  "What are you trying say, Noface?" the bronze dragaoin questioned angrily.

  Alec turned just before a new voice cried out, "He's calling you a traitor, Traitor!"

  Glint bleeding even though wrapped with a thick improvised bandage around his chest stood pointing at the bronze wizard. All eyes turned to the hobgoblin in surprise. Alec hadn't even seen the little creature as they had moved through the keep. There had not been a second opening or closing of stone doors since they had come down to the cellar. Where the hobgoblin had come from, he didn't know.

  "What are you going on about, goblin?" Nadron practically snarled at him. "I am no..."

  "I saw you kill Duerog. You shot him in the back then slew Ashram with your magic too. When you broke the door, I signaled the alarm. The hollows nearly got me, but then again Torok nearly got you. He saw you kill his kin, but those hollows were too many.

  "Waerd got a couple cuts in and nearly beat you to your room. Without your new friends, you wouldn't have made it."

  "You're crazy, goblin!" the bronze wizard snarled and Alec watched as his fingers started to move in a particular pattern. The wizard's magic began to build enough for his senses to catch it as well.

  The boy started to raise an alarm in that moment, but he was too slow. A ball of fire went for the small creature, but in a whiff of mist Helios was standing in front of the cook. Fire struck the silver dragaoin, but a blue shield appeared breaking the flames around him. Glint cringed and fell to the floor in fear.

  "Give up, you traitor," Helios ordered in a surprisingly calm voice. There was no other noticeable spell readied by the silver sorcerer, but Alec didn't doubt that he was ready to fight even so.

  "Why am I the traitor, son of dragons?" Nadron asked. His hands didn't shift, but Alec and Shaelamee backed off ready to be of assistance seeing that this situation was getting out of control. "These dark elves came to our world to rob it of its magic. They killed millions of us in the war with their accursed time sand and took what they wanted. Sure they didn't kill Atropos completely, but only so that they could strip it again and again.

  "Now our ancestors have been returned by this world and they make us destroy them! Those who didn't flee to Cenestraya fight side by side with the hollows. The Haileni are our real people. Fighting against them would make me the traitor. You are a traitor, Helios!"

  "Our leaders chose to follow the Ciemnosci. If they choose to side with the Haileni, then I will join them in this fight; but until they know what is going on here I must do my duty to the empire. You should too. We need to stop the Haileni for now. Maybe there is another way if we show them what is happening here."

  Nadron's eyes narrowed. "The Ciemnosci already know."

&
nbsp; At Helios' perplexed look, the bronze wizard chuckled sadly. "Haven't you figured out? You lack a true nose, but I assumed that you still had a brain.

  "The only ones allowed to research the hollows have always been the dark elves. They tell you what they want you to know. They tell us that the hollows are empty, mindless monsters that only seek to kill the living.

  "You fool; they've been lying to us this whole time! Open your eyes. Those allowed to live have become more intelligent. Given time either the ancestors' minds will return or they will create their own unique souls. Either way, we need to throw these dark elves off of Atropos and give our world time to recover. It shouldn't be left to their greedy wants. If they didn't kill Atropos this time, they very well might the next.

  "Stop being an idiot. Kill these other creatures and join us. I'll give you one last chance, Helios."

  "You give me one last chance? I've told you what needs to be done and I certainly won't kill my friends. They didn't ask for this anymore than we did.

  "Now you stand down, traitor. You've killed your allies. You stabbed them in the back with your deceit and treachery. That does make you a traitor no matter what you say you believe. You have done evil, Nadron. Surrender and accept your punishment."

  With a roar, the bronze dragon lunged forward spewing lightning from his mouth. Again the blue shielding arose, but Alec could see that Helios took the brunt of the dragaoin's breath weapon even so. When the light returned to normal, the silver dragaoin's scales smoked from the heat of the breath weapon.

  Lowering his arms, Helios glared at the wizard and said, "That was a mistake."

  Blue beams of light lashed out from the sorcerer's hands striking the wizard who shrunk back throwing out a similar blue shield to protect him from the cold. Lightning flared from the wizard's hands in retaliation, but Helios disappeared in another puff of mist.

  "Hold," Helios whispered in the bronze dragaoin's ear as he reappeared behind the other man.

  Letting out a small grunt as his body seized up, fear suddenly flared on Nadron's face. Even for Alec, it was easy to see.