“You would be quite correct, Archon. The investigation found evidence that the caverns are a dungeon,” Jared replied simply. “How old, I don’t know. It seems to be primarily occupied by plants and animals at the moment, with some of the plants able to move and attack. The animals are mutated and far more powerful than normal, but the scouts have had difficulty investigating the caves. Beyond that I do not know much. I intend to forward the full dispatches to you this evening.”
“Please do so. A dungeon, hmm? In the foothills of the Godsrage Mountains? Most interesting indeed.” The Archon considered the matter, and a smile grew on his face, then he nodded firmly, grinning. “Actually, this is excellent! Jared, you are to immediately begin construction on a town there. Ensure that there are buildings for the full range of comforts for adventurers, as well as the major equipment Kelvanis produces. Include a brothel as well as an auction house. I wish it well staffed and guarded, but unlike most locations inside our borders, we will allow anyone access to the town. Tax two percent of their acquisitions inside the dungeon, and a tithe for the auction house. I’ll consider further details, but we’ll also establish a temple there to revive the injured or recently dead.”
“Ah, yes, My Lord!” Jared replied reflexively as his mind tried to catch up, taken aback by the sudden enthusiasm of the Archon. “May I ask why we’re doing this?”
“Publicity, and if they auction off their finds at the town, we’ll have the first chance to get them,” the Archon spoke without missing a beat, grinning. “It will also draw more revenue to the kingdom, which also means more potential markets for our slaves. Adventurers tend to be astonishingly selfish as a whole. I should know, as I used to be one.”
“I see. I’ll get to work at once, My Lord,” Jared acknowledged, bowing in spite of his shock at the sudden change of priorities. He hadn’t expected such a rapid response, or the particular revelation about the Archon’s past.
“Excellent! Now, as it appears that was all you wished to speak to me about, I must go see to other matters of state. Keep up the good work, Jared, and keep me informed!” The Archon gave a jaunty wave, and the mirror’s glow faded back to his own reflection again.
“Well, that was certainly interesting,” Jared muttered, shaking his head, then gave Topaz a wry smile. “I might have to move my base of operations to get that up and running for a while, too.”
Topaz gave him a look that was filled with complex emotions, as expected, but after a moment, spoke in her beautiful voice. “As you say, My Lord.”
He sighed, shaking his head. She’d come around eventually. Personally, he was looking forward to Serel’s return for another reason entirely. He couldn’t wait to have an entire group of priestesses to try his experiments. But for now, he had work to do.
* * *
“Danny, you know your knife is sharp, right?” Fredrick asked, his tone resigned.
Daniel didn’t reply, simply sharpening his dagger on the whetstone as he stared at the entrance into the dungeon. The dungeon that had eaten Sina. The thought of what must have happened to her filled his stomach with bile and hatred.
Before he’d met Sina, he honestly hadn’t cared one way or another about slavery. The only people who became slaves were severe debtors, criminals who would be otherwise be sentenced to death or life in a labor camp, or foreigners. Sina had changed that for him.
She wasn’t beautiful, not for an elf. She was plain even by human standards, and she wasn’t strong or skilled in any way. She was a farm girl with minimal skills, so she’d been assigned to the military. To Daniel’s unit.
At first he’d flirted with her because he thought it was amusing. But after a while of interacting with the dusk elf, his thoughts had begun to change. When he had time and could get away, he’d talk with her about a host of subjects, from her homeland to his childhood. They couldn’t afford to be seen together, but he’d done what he could to make sure she and the other slaves were treated at least a little better. After their talks had turned to trysts, he’d finally started saving up to purchase her from the military. He couldn’t bear to see her stay there for any longer than she had to, as little more than bait to draw out opponents.
And Daniel had saved every copper bit, everything he could scrimp for that purpose. Some of the others had joked about how he didn’t show up at the gambling nights anymore, and teased him about him spending his coin in the brothels. They didn’t know what he was doing. He’d saved so much of what he needed, and another month, just one more month, and he would have been able to purchase her. To set her free, and court her in earnest.
Instead. he’d watched her get dragged up out of his reach by a plant, helpless to stop it. Rage burned in his gut, and he vowed he’d avenge her. And as he thought, the soft rasping sound of his blade against the whetstone continued.
Chapter 21
A part of Sistina was annoyed that she’d taken the two slaves and let them live in her caverns. Mostly it was Ilmas who she was annoyed with, if she was being honest with herself, which she should be. What would she gain by lying to herself, anyway? But no matter how she thought about it, it still irritated her.
The two elves had readily agreed to have her take their brands for her own once Lily had explained what was going on. Sina had seemed a bit hesitant, but she’d agreed anyway, which was good enough for Sistina. And that was when she’d learned that Ilmas produced perhaps two-thirds as much mana as Sina once he’d been claimed. The difference was incredibly aggravating, and Sistina had studied both of them in depth, trying to figure out what the difference between them was.
Both were healthy enough, though not exceptionally so. Neither had magical talent either, which she suspected would increase the mana flow. Neither were terribly exceptional in any way, so she simply couldn’t understand why a different set of reproductive organs would cause such a marked difference between them. That was the first tiny irritant that annoyed her, but she held herself back, telling herself that it wasn’t his fault that he wasn’t as efficient of a mana source as the two women were.
No, the irritation truly came to the fore when Ilmas began flirting with Lily. It hadn’t taken Sistina long to realize that what she was seeing was courting behavior, and she didn’t worry too much about it, until she realized that somehow, the distraction from Sistina herself was slowly weakening Lily’s mental link to her. But despite her sudden urge to interfere, Sistina had chosen to simply sit back and let things happen.
She might like Lily, and value her as a companion that had brought the first hints of true thought back to Sistina, but she wasn’t going to actually control the young woman’s life. Certainly, elves could live the better part of a thousand years, but Sistina was a magically enhanced tree. She would likely not die for thousands of years, if not more, if she wasn’t killed. It wouldn’t be fair to Lily to do that to her. No matter how much she wanted to strangle the young man taking her devoted servant away from her.
So Sistina turned her attention to Sina, who also confused her. The other elf seemed oddly depressed much of the time, though she did seem to enjoy being free. Sistina kept her distance though, concerned that if she tried to get close to another person she’d only be setting herself up for more annoyance in the future.
In the meantime, the least she could do was get the three some better weapons. Something about how the group outside was watching the cavern entrance made her nervous. She was also working on merging plants with what she’d learned of humans before, since she was no longer confident that the animals and plants could keep others out. The second group had startled her with how badly they’d destroyed an entire sub-cavern of her domain.
That fire mage had frightened her more than she cared to admit, even in the privacy of her own mind.
“So does Sistina usually leave you alone?” Ilmas asked Lily as they waited for the bread to rise. The elven man was much more relaxed than he had been the first day. “I haven’t seen more than hints of her since she changed my brand.
”
“Hmm… actually, this is a little unusual. She usually comes to see me once or twice a day. Sometimes she even says a word or two,” Lily told him, musing as she looked over toward Sistina’s tree. “She hasn’t talked to me for a day or two, but you two are the first new company we’ve had in a few weeks. Sistina isn’t really someone who strikes me as the type to come see us without a specific reason to do so. I’m beginning to think she was just trying to help keep me sane before.”
“That’s really kind of her. I was surprised that she would help us without any ulterior motives,” Ilmas replied, his smile revealing bright white teeth that contrasted well with his brown skin. It was surprisingly comfortable to Lily, who smiled back in spite of herself, a warmth growing in her chest. “I had half-expected something horrible to happen. Of course, if she’d wanted to do that, she probably wouldn’t have pulled us out of the plants.”
“Mmm. I’m not sure she didn’t have some reason other than rescuing you, to be honest. I think that the brands help her, somehow. Maybe they increase her power, without affecting us?” Lily guessed, shrugging. “Whatever the case, she also doesn’t convert brands when the bearer doesn’t want her to, so I think we can trust her.”
“Huh. Oddly, that makes me feel a little better about everything. Knowing that she actually does get something out of it makes me feel less like another boot’s going to drop out of the sky and crush me like a bug.” Ilmas chuckled, seeming relieved. “In my experience, most people want something from you. Worrying about what they’re after is almost worse than knowing.”
“Silly man.” Lily smiled mischievously, and then leaned over and kissed him. He pulled her into his arms, and she all but melted into his warmth as he held her, close and secure.
She’d never been happier, she thought dreamily, smiling as she broke off the kiss.
Sina chewed on her lower lip as she looked at the entrance to the cavern. She missed Daniel.
Oh, she didn’t miss being one of the trap-springing slaves that the traitorous git Evansly used for so many tasks. But Daniel? Polite, sweet Daniel? She missed him fiercely, and was more than a little worried about how he might have reacted to her disappearance. He probably thought she was dead, and she couldn’t do anything to reassure him at all. She didn’t dare go outside, since the soldiers would inevitably figure out that something was wrong with her brand, and then where would she be?
Sistina plopping onto the log next to her nearly made her jump out of her skin. Sina yelped, then let out a breath of relief as she spoke, “Goddess, don’t do that! You scared me.”
The dryad shrugged in response, not overly worried. Then she offered Sina what looked like a dagger in a simple wooden sheath. The hilt was leather, and Sina blinked for a moment before looking up at Sistina, seeking confirmation. “For me?”
At the dryad’s nod, she took the dagger. The blade seemed oddly lightweight, which caused her curiosity to stir more. Drawing the blade, she blinked as she saw a wooden blade within, slightly curved and with an odd silver sheen to it. She frowned at the blade, tilting her head in concern as she asked, “A wooden blade? Is that going to work?”
Sistina sighed, shaking her head as she grabbed a fallen branch. Reaching out with the branch, she pressed it against the dagger’s edge, and to Sina’s shock, it cut through the inch-thick branch like a hot knife through butter.
“I… I see.” Blinking at the knife, she finally smiled at Sistina. Her voice was soft as she spoke. “Thank you, Sistina. It’s a lovely dagger, and I hope it will help me.”
Sistina simply nodded, patting Sina on the shoulder, and stood up to leave. Watching her go, Sina thought for a moment, then sheathed the dagger, considering how she was going to secure it to her belt.
At least now she felt a little safer than she had before. And maybe, just maybe, she might be able to convince Sistina not to hurt Daniel.
Not many people really thought about looking down. For Sistina, it was a little more complicated, considering that to a certain extent, she was able to ‘see’ everything within the area of her domain. Her primary goal when expanding her domain had been to get through the caverns toward the outdoors, but as the area was approximately a bubble centered on herself, she’d encompassed not just the caverns in the mountain above, but also the areas far below her roots.
But that didn’t really mean that she’d paid much attention to that area before this. That tendency had changed after the fire mage, and she was carefully combing through the dirt, stone, hidden caverns, and old buildings buried beneath her in search of something that could help calm her anxiety. She really didn’t like fire magic.
There was a surprising amount of raw metals and gemstones buried down here, as well as the ruins of the old capital as well. At first nothing caught her eye as being useful, but about halfway through carefully examination, she came across a building that was relatively intact despite being fully buried. Most of the intact buildings thus far had been either filled with rubble or in caverns like her own. This one was intact despite the pressure of stone around it, and it took her a minute to realize why she hadn’t noticed the rather large building before.
As she concentrated on it, Sistina began to see the streamers of magic running through the structure of the building, extremely faint to her ‘sight’ and trying to deflect her attention from the building. It took her some time to determine that the structure was warded against magical sight or scrying, and that was why seeing it was difficult for her. Curious, she tried to extend her awareness inside the building, only to find it dark to her vision. With a mental sigh, she realized that she’d have to go in person to figure out what was going on with the building. She couldn’t do that right now, so she set it aside for the time being and continued her explorations.
Several more warded buildings appeared as she kept delving, and Sistina got a certain amount of sardonic amusement out of finding another temple protected by their deity buried fairly deeply in the earth, but this one without a convenient guardian. Passing it by, it was then that she stopped and her mental eyes began to gleam.
Near the very extremities of her perceptions below the earth was what appeared to be a dwarven foundry, one that must have been down here before the city was buried. Heat pervaded it, but it was surprisingly intact. And below it, just outside of the reach of her senses, she felt a deep, pulsing heat, and the mana in the stone was stronger there. A ley line node, just out of her reach? A third one, she corrected herself, mentally looking back to the ones she’d linked to back near her cavern. While they wouldn’t dramatically increase her growth, they should help her magical affinities. A fire affinity would also aid in defending her from fire, which seemed very beneficial.
And the sheer depth that she had reached gave her other ideas for how to protect herself as well. Why let those coming after her come straight through the caverns? Why not make the hallways snake downward in a maze, and then add a second maze coming back upward? Sistina felt a hint of contentment come over her as she mentally began sketching out the way she’d want the tunnels to go, figuring out how to best defend herself against assaults. And then she stopped, feeling stupid as she opened her eyes.
Why hadn’t she just gone to the library she’d been excavating and read up on what dungeons did to defend themselves? At least it was an easy mistake to correct. So Sistina headed toward the library with the faintest sigh of self-reproach.
Chapter 22
“Are you sure you want to do this, Sis? I’m still not entirely comfortable with taking your place in the line of succession,” Zanath asked Phynis, honest concern on his face. They were in her sitting room, having a late-morning tea as they spoke.
“What’s the oath of House Constella?” Phynis asked in return.
“Temper power with responsibility, be humble when needed, and protect your people with all your ability,” he replied promptly, blushing slightly in embarrassment before adding, “I’ve always thought you were better at it, to be honest.”<
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“Be that as it may, Zanath, I’m compromised. You’ve been training as my potential replacement in the case of an accident to begin with, and I know you can do it.” Phynis smiled at him, gently hitting him in the shoulder. “Besides, your girlfriend seems absolutely delighted to hear about your new position. Even if she has to step down as Duchess to marry you.”
“Elina is certainly overly enthusiastic about the situation. It makes me a little uncomfortable, to be honest,” Zanath admitted, shaking his head as he rubbed his shoulder in mock pain. “I know she doesn’t hate you, but she loves the idea of the status, I think.”
“Status or no, you’re the heir now. Even if we find a way to remove the brands permanently in the future, who’s to say that the nobility would be willing to actually accept me back as the heir?” Phynis told him, growing more serious as she shook her head. “No, by the time we figure anything out, it will probably be too late for that. You should get used to the idea of being the King, Zanath. I sincerely doubt that I have any chance of inheriting, even if the brand vanished this very instant.”
“But part of that’s just because they’re excluding you from the policy meetings and such, like the one that’s coming up this afternoon,” he protested, scowling. “It isn’t fair to you at all. You’ve been training for this for your entire life!”
“Again, it comes back to me being compromised. If I get captured again, they can order me to tell them everything I know about the kingdom’s defenses,” Phynis explained, sighing softly. “So the best defense is to make certain that I don’t know anything about information that’s dangerous.”
“Oh, I…” Zanath paused at the explanation, looking startled before nodding in understanding. “That does make more sense than what was initially explained to me.”
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