“It’s, um...austere,” Kyel muttered beside him, then led his horse in after Naia’s.
That was one word for it. Darien had never much cared for the temples of Death he had been inside, although this was the first time he had actually been under the roof of a satellite shrine of the goddess. His mother had often compelled him to go with her on the frequent visits she had made to Death’s temple in Aerysius to offer votives for his father. Those trips had always disturbed him, and he’d always left there with the feeling that the Atrament must be a cold and dismal place.
Within, the shrine was just like a temple, only on a much smaller scale, complete with all of the typical trappings. There were tapers glowing in iron sconces at the entrance and at the far two corners of the room. Across the wall in the back was a ledge that contained a few small votives, three of them glowing. Darien wondered who tended the shrine; someone had to keep the tapers lit and sweep out the floor occasionally. But there was no one within and certainly no space where anyone could possibly be living.
He led his horse into the room, bringing it up beside the priestess’s roan mare. The dark gelding tossed its head as its hooves encountered the unfamiliar surface, but otherwise went in cooperatively. The space inside was barely large enough to contain the three horses. The priestess moved all the way forward to the wall that held the votive candles, staring down almost reverently at the three tiny flames.
Darien felt drawn toward the votives himself. Each of those fragile lights represented a prayer for a departed soul. It had been a long time since he had offered such a prayer. Compelled by a whim, he moved forward beside Naia, reaching down to encircle his fingers around one of the fresh candles on the ledge. The priestess’s eyes darted down, following the motion of his hand, but she said nothing as Darien held the smooth candle before him, contemplating it silently.
He found a striker on the ledge and took it into his hand. He depressed the mechanism with his thumb, but the flint was old, and it took him a few squeezes to create a spark. The wick of the candle flared up immediately, producing a strong, healthy glow as he set the votive down on the ledge with the others, laying the striker beside it.
But then something happened that was entirely unexpected. The glowing yellow flame darkened as if a shadow had passed over it. The light dimmed, becoming pale. As Darien stared in trepidation, the candle’s flame flared up brilliantly as if seized by a sudden draft of wind then turned a filthy, sickly shade of green. Darien couldn’t take his eyes from it, filled with horrified recognition. It was the same terrible light as the pillar of energy he had seen in the sky above Aerysius. The putrid, ethereal glow of the Netherworld.
Beside him, Naia hissed like a feral cat. Her hand swiped out, snatching the votive from the shelf and casting it to the floor, where she stomped on it with her feet until the candle was reduced to nothing more than a shattered pile of crumbled tallow. The violence of her reaction appalled Darien almost as much as the sight of that terrible green flame. With one last kick of her white slipper, she sent the whole pile scattering across the dark tiles of the floor.
Then she rounded on him, shrieking, “How dare you desecrate the altar of the goddess with that abomination! Whose spirit was that votive meant for? How do you even know a soul so vile?”
Darien took a step back away from her, struggling to control the sorrow that was threatening to overwhelm him. But the priestess was relentless. She advanced on him, eyes flaring in anger and revulsion.
“Tell me who that votive was for!”
Darien twisted away from her with a wounded growl. He hung his head, scrubbing his hands through his hair as he fought for the strength he needed to give voice to what had once been his most terrible fear, now twice confirmed. In a cold and dismal voice, he said, “Her name was Meiran Withersby.”
“Who is that?” Naia demanded, her eyes narrowing in confusion. “It takes hideous acts to condemn a soul to the Netherworld.”
Darien couldn’t bear to meet the priestess’s eyes as he admitted in a bare whisper, “She was the woman I loved. My brother killed her with my sword then committed her soul to Xerys to unseal the Well of Tears.”
Naia’s mouth fell open, the anger draining away from her face to be replaced by a look of horrified disbelief. Slowly, she shook her head, sagging visibly as she breathed, “Gods’ mercy, Darien.”
A terrible anger suffused him at her choice of words, eclipsing even the pain of his grief. “The gods have no mercy,” he grated as he spun away from her, boots echoing loudly as he crossed the floor of the shrine in trudging strides to the doorway. There, he stopped, staring out into the cool autumn sunlight, choking back the threat of tears. It was a truly beautiful day. He tried to take comfort in it, but found that he could not. There was only one thing he could think of that would ever bring him peace.
Darien closed his eyes, envisioning what it would feel like to drive his blade hilt-deep into his brother’s living chest.
He lingered there in the entrance, leaning against a smooth marble column that supported the overhang of the roof. Behind him, he could hear the priestess and Kyel conferring quietly in lowered voices, too soft for him to make out the words. But he didn’t need to hear to know what they must be saying.
Finally, the quiet conversation ended. The sound of hesitant footfalls moved toward him across the tile. Darien turned as Kyel drew up to stand beside him. His young acolyte had been silently seething at him all morning, but now there was only a look of uncertain kindness in his quiet blue eyes.
“Naia says we need to go,” Kyel told him, then reached up to place a tentative hand on his arm. “Are you all right?”
Darien nodded, swallowing. He closed his thoughts to his grief, walling it away in the back of his mind and sealing it there with the mortar of his will. He was surprised, actually, and quite moved by Kyel’s concern. After what he had put the young man through the night before, Darien wouldn’t have blamed him for holding fast to his resentment.
“Thank you,” he whispered.
He turned and walked back into the shrine, away from the light of day. Inside, he found Naia occupied with lighting the tapers of a candelabra set into a recess in the wall. Darien looked on as the priestess moved to touch the wick of each taper with the glowing end of a slender wooden splint, working in no apparent order until the very last candle was lit. Then she reached out and extinguished the splint between her thumb and index finger. Darien frowned, wondering what the purpose of the candle lighting had been, watching as the woman moved back into the center of the room and took up the reins of her mare. She glanced toward him, a frown of concern on her face.
“The horses may not like this part,” she warned him.
Darien took her point. Moving to the head of his own horse, he grasped its bridle under the gelding’s chin, staring down at the powdered tallow that was all that remained of Meiran’s candle. It was such a simple thing, a votive. Simple, and yet amazingly profound. That was all he had wanted: just one, simple, heartfelt prayer. Yet, it seemed even that was denied him. The remains of his good intentions were strewn across the floor under his feet like so much scattered dust. He tried to avert his eyes from the sight, but it was impossible. His gaze kept slipping back to the sad remnants of the votive despite every effort of his will.
As he stared down at the crumbled tallow on the floor, he realized that it was vibrating, shimmying as the floor itself shook under his feet.
Startled, Darien glanced up at the priestess. Her smile of reassurance calmed him, but nevertheless he didn’t like the way the floor seemed suddenly unstable, the vibrations increasing. A terrible screeching groan like the rake of metal against rusted metal shrieked through the chamber, then abruptly the floor was moving, jolting downward.
His horse screamed, trying to rear back as Darien clung to its bridle and almost lost his footing. His stomach took a plunge as the floor lurched sharply out from under him and then settled, lowering almost smoothly. He glanced up, amazed,
as the walls of the chamber seemed to stretch above him.
“If you’d wanted to scare me, it’s working,” Kyel muttered, staring upward with wide, terrified eyes. All around them the walls of the chamber seemed to be lengthening, the ledge where the votives yet glowed rising ever higher above their heads.
“Kyel, sense the field for me here,” Darien directed, feeling wretchedly ill at ease. The currents of the vortex were lethal to him, but he was only asking his acolyte to practice the same technique he had taught him the night before. He watched Kyel’s face, pleased to see that the young man showed absolutely no sign of effort or fear of pain.
“It’s not so intense,” Kyel reported after a minute.
Darien allowed himself a slight smile, feeling somewhat comforted. That not only explained the motion of the floor, but it also meant that he could soon take a sample of the field himself. Not just yet; he wasn’t a fool. But he had been strangled for almost two days with the frustration of the barrier he had been forced to erect in his mind against the vortex, and he was intensely grateful to know that at least that strain was almost done with.
But the darkening of the chamber quickly staunched any relief he might have felt. The floor jolted again, coming to a rest as the light just suddenly seemed to leech away as if sucked into the shadows of the walls. A crack appeared along the floor in front of them, yawning wider until it was an opening that shed a soft amber glow into the darkness.
Naia led her mare through the doorway first then waited for them to join her. Darien led his own horse forward over the black and gray tiles. He found himself in a dim, cavernous hall. The source of the light came from huge urn-shaped braziers spaced at wide intervals along the walls. The ceiling was high, suspended by a triple set of massive black arches that thrust upward imposingly, curving out from the tops of wide stone columns that marched side-by-side the length of the room. The walls themselves were carved all around in bas-relief, depicting various images from the Book of the Dead in bold iconography.
“What is this place?” Kyel wondered, openly gawking as he brought his horse forward into the space between the twin rows of columns.
“It is called the Inner Sanctum,” Naia informed him, her voice reverberating hollowly through the room. “Our temple has many holy mysteries, and halls such as this are one of them. Knowledge of its purpose is reserved only for initiates of Death’s priesthood. Of course, should you wish to learn more, you could always join,” she added with a smile.
“He’s spoken for,” Darien assured her.
Kyel winced, looking a bit pale, but nodded adamantly as his eyes continued to rove over the dark grandeur of the place.
They led their horses up the aisle under the central span of arches. The sounds of the animals’ hooves echoed off the walls and ceiling, the noises magnified tremendously by the marble surfaces. As they approached the far end of the room, Darien noticed that there were two dark passages ahead opening out of opposing walls. He could see nothing within, not even a foot beyond the openings; the passageways were dark, as black as night. It was as if the dim light of the chamber just stopped at the thresholds, prevented from spreading even an inch further.
Naia stopped her horse and moved down its length to her saddlebag, fishing out three silk scarves. She took one for herself, tossing the other two to Darien, who frowned down at them in his hand before handing one over to Kyel. As he watched, the priestess took her scarf and began wrapping it around the mare’s head under the bridle, covering its eyes. Darien moved to the head of his own mount and did the same, winding the fine material like a bandage around the Tarkendar’s black face.
“These doorways mark the entrance to Death’s Passage,” Naia explained as she watched him tying off the scarf.
When Kyel was done with his horse, Naia led them toward the black, gaping hole on the right. There, she drew up and turned toward them, a look of grave warning in her veiled eyes.
“Before we enter, know this: the Catacombs exist partly in the Atrament. There are many mysteries within which you will doubtlessly find troubling. And there are dangers, as well. Especially now that Death’s secret has been compromised. We must exercise great care, yet proceed as quickly as we can. Fortunately, the way is not long.
“And I must warn you: the living are expressly forbidden to communicate with the dead. You must ignore any shade that tries to distract you. If you do not, then you will be guilty of breaking the Strictures of Death, and as penalty you will not be allowed to pass back out again into the world of life.”
She fixed her gaze on Darien significantly, dipping her chin slightly as she warned him, “I gravely fear what manner of shades you might draw to yourself.”
Darien felt a kindling spark of anger as he reminded her, “Meiran’s not there, remember?”
But Naia shook her head, a regretful smile on her face. “I would love to meet your Meiran,” she assured him softly, “but I was not referring to her. I was thinking, rather, of the troubling fact that just about every person you’ve ever known has died.”
“Just about,” Darien agreed reluctantly.
“Remember the Stricture. No matter what you see, you must not interact with the dead in any way.”
“I’ll do my best to remember that.”
Naia nodded and turned away from him toward the dark opening of the doorway. She paused a moment, bowing her head as if in prayer, then stepped through. As she passed across the threshold, a shadow fell upon her. Her image flickered once then was gone, lost completely in the darkness that quickly moved to consume her horse, as well.
“Are you sure you don’t want to ride to Glen Farquist?” Kyel grumbled, staring bleakly at the dark passage ahead.
Kyel looked pale as he sucked in a deep breath and, holding it, stepped through the doorway. Darien watched, fascinated, as his image flickered before disappearing altogether, just as Naia’s had. He was starting to get the sense that there was much more magic involved here than in just the trip down; Death’s mysteries seemed to be fairly riddled with the workings of magecraft. Which suggested a partnership that must have existed, at least at one time, between the priesthood of Isap and Aerysius itself. He could easily imagine such a trade-off. It would have been well worth the effort for the ancient Masters to assist in the development of the Catacombs if in exchange they were allowed uninhibited access to them.
Shrugging off his thoughts, Darien whispered a soft word of comfort to his horse then led the animal forward. As he crossed the threshold of the doorway, it seemed as if the world wavered for an instant when the shadow fell over his eyes. He experienced a momentary surge of vertigo, as if the framework of reality had suddenly shifted. But then the shadow parted and the motion of the world steadied. Blinking, he stepped out of the darkness into a dim stone passage.
The priestess and Kyel were there ahead, waiting for him. The passage was more like a cave, crudely bored out of solid rock. A soft light glowed along the walls and clung to the ceiling, a misty silver luminescence. Magelight, Darien realized, staring in open wonder. He had never seen its like outside of Aerysius itself.
“Welcome to the Catacombs,” the priestess announced in a near-whisper.
They walked forward, following the downward slope of the corridor, the horses picking their way as if hesitant of their footing. The passage was as frigid as an ice cellar, and there was a distinctively stale odor to the place. Shadows cast by the constantly churning magelight made lurid progressions across the rough stone walls. A strange fog clung thickly to the floor, stirred up by their footsteps. Darien didn’t like the feel of the air around him; it seemed thin, almost stretched. Even sound seemed to carry differently through it. The plod of the horses’ hooves sounded stifled and hesitant. There was a peculiar reverberation to the noise, almost like a muffled echo.
After a few hundred paces the passage took a sharp turn and then opened up into an immense, yawning space. Darien let his eyes wander up the far wall and found himself having to crane his n
eck back to get a glimpse of the ceiling high above. This was no mere cavern. The chamber they were in could have engulfed the entire Hall of the Watchers several times over. And the walls were not solid. Darien studied them, attempting to figure out the architecture that lent the cavern an almost honeycombed appearance. Then it dawned on him: the holes in the walls were vaults. Thousands of them, each vault containing white-shrouded human remains.
The entire chamber was a vast, enormous tomb. It even smelled like one. His nose was accosted with the commingled stench of myrrh and decay. In front of him, he heard Kyel make a gagging noise, looking as if he were going to be ill. The priestess seemed completely unaffected; this was, after all, her profession. Darien found himself darkly speculating how many moldering corpses Naia had washed and blessed before she had become so immune to the stench of death.
He gazed at the priestess, wondering what had so possessed the young woman to choose such a grim occupation in the first place. She was young, and elegantly lovely. Naia would have had suitors lined up at her door, if she were a common maid. But, he had to admit, there was nothing common about her. She carried herself with an air of confidence that was compelling, and her dark eyes behind her veil shone with the spark of intelligence and a wisdom far beyond her age. He had to force himself to avert his gaze, finding it almost difficult to remove his eyes from her. Despite himself, he found the priestess intriguing. More intriguing than he would have liked.
His eyes lingered on her back as Naia led them out into the middle of the vast chamber, the vaults rising before and behind them to the ceiling hundreds of feet overhead. They walked down the center of the cavern, past rows of sarcophagi that, as often as not, were carved with the likenesses of the dead they contained. Darien found himself confronted by the stone and marble faces of men, women, and even children.
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