by M. H. Bonham
Salazar smiled wanly. “We got the call about a half hour ago. The elevator which goes all the way to the level which meets the Argo tunnel stopped, and there’s no way for us to recall it. Our guys who run the tour said the elevator just stopped with no explanation.”
“Could it just be broken down?” I asked.
“That’s what they thought until they got the doors open and found the whole level in darkness. And the knocking began.”
“Tommyknockers?” Elryn looked at me.
“Possibly, or Hobgoblins. They can frequent below ground.”
“Yeah, sometimes we get those,” spoke up one of the employees. She was a flossy blonde with blue eyes who couldn’t be out of high school, by my reckoning. She wore a blue worker’s jumpsuit and a Gold Nugget Mine name tag with the name, Melissa. “They’re mostly okay. I’ve met them. They know we’re running tourists and leave us alone. The Tommyknockers sometimes do the knocking to provide extra ambiance when we show people around. The mine owner has us bring down food for them, so they stay happy. It’s really a win-win for everyone involved. This knocking is different, though.”
“Yeah,” said the other worker. She was a brunette about my age with short-cropped hair. Her skin color suggested some Latino in her background. Like her coworker, she wore a blue jumpsuit and a name tag. Hers read Camille. “The knocking was different. The Tommyknockers make a rapping noise, like someone tapping on rock. We heard it over the mike before we lost communications. These were loud booms or thuds.”
“Why do you think this is the work of terrorists or Dark Elves?” Duncan asked.
“Before we lost contact, we heard screaming and someone said ‘Drow.’” Salazar said. “I heard it.”
Shit. I mentally swore. The people down there—assuming they were still alive—could’ve been wrong, but I highly doubted it. You’d have to be completely disconnected from the Internet and the news to miss the Dark Elf attacks. After giving the Drow a bloody nose by rendering their alchemical toxin machines ineffective and closing the Gateways, I figured we’d had a chance to catch our breath. Apparently not.
“It could still be Hobgoblins,” Elryn remarked, but one look at her face and I knew she didn’t believe it either. Maybe the Light Elf had enough killing for one day? I kind of doubted it, though; Light Elves and Dark Elves are mortal enemies. A Light Elf will kill a Dark Elf on sight without mercy, which made me awfully glad the Light Elves were on Humanity’s side.
“How do we get down there?” I asked, hoping that the answer wouldn’t be rappelling down into darkness.
“There’s a maintenance elevator that goes to the main shaft,” said Camille. “From there, you can access the shafts that lead down to the Argo tunnel. But it’s tricky to get to.”
“Naturally.” I glanced at Luna. I really didn’t want my girlfriend in danger, even if she was a werewolf and could take care of herself in most situations.
“How do we get in?” Duncan asked. “Do you have a map of the mine?”
“Right here.” Camille led us to a cartoon version of a map on the wall, obviously intended for visitors. “Sorry, this is all we have.” She traced an unmarked line that ran down the tunnel network. “This is the maintenance elevator. It goes to the main shaft where we can walk to the shaft that leads down to the Argo tunnel. The shaft is narrow and dark, though. And it requires some climbing experience.”
“How big is the drop?” I asked.
Camille squinched up her face as she considered the question. “Thirty feet, maybe?”
“How good is your rappel?” Duncan asked.
Something on my face said I’d rather not, because he raised an eyebrow. “I’ve done it a few times while in the academy.” I didn’t mention how inwardly I screamed like a scared banshee. Some things you just can’t admit. “If we’ve got to do it, let’s do it.”
“The maintenance elevator really only fits four people,” Camille said. She looked at Tuzren dubiously. “There’s no way you’ll be able to find the shaft on your own. I’ll have to lead you.”
“Tuz can go on ahead of us,” I said. I turned to the demon. “If you find the people, make sure they’re safe. You’re big enough to scare just about anything.”
The rule of Gateways and teleportation is that you just can’t teleport to somewhere you’ve never been—unless you have a map or diagram. The first successful teleporting must have been by trial and error—probably with more on the error side. If you didn’t have a concept of where you would land, it was incredibly dangerous—like a transporter accident in Star Trek. You might end up inside rock. Dead. Or partially inside someone else. Both dead. Or under water. Dead. Or 20,000 feet up and falling. Dead. Or in outer space…
Well, you get the idea.
Having someone in your party who has been there before is sketchy, but terribly dangerous, unless your mind reading is amazingly good. That’s why it amazed me that people teleported between universes. Someone had to take that first step. Maybe it was the gods, because it sure as shit wouldn’t have been humans, despite our natural curiosity. We just weren’t around for more than a couple million years, if you count our less evolved ancestors. In a universe that is almost fourteen billion years old, there was bound to be more ancient creatures to do it first. Having only a cartoon map to perform a teleport didn’t seem to faze the demon, though.
Tuzren grinned and that smile chilled me to the bone. “If you need help, call me.”
“Will do, but those tourists and guides are the first concern.”
“Got it.” Tuzren popped out.
“That leaves me, you, and one of your other crew,” Duncan said. “Salazar, I want you to be on support. We’ll need you and any other member Ironspell leaves here for additional help.”
I turned to Luna. “If it’s Drow, Elryn is the better choice,” I said. “I’m sorry, Luna.”
Luna nodded. She smiled, showing her fangs. If it had been anyone else, I would’ve hesitated. I gave her a kiss on her furry snout and she nearly frenched me with that long wolf tongue. Okay, I’m just not into mostly changed weres, what can I say? I was looking forward to the new moon when her werewolf change would be at its minimal state. She giggled, knowing my discomfort.
“All right,” I said, wiping wolf spit off my face. “Let’s get this done.”
Chapter Three
Going deep into the mine via the maintenance elevator was like going into the pit of hell, itself. Given that we had a demon with us just meant we were ready for it. The maintenance elevator was much smaller than I anticipated. I expected enough room for four large men, not room for four skinny, preteen girls. Or four pixies. Or four tiny anythings.
Our gear was pretty simple: hard hats with lamps on them, radios, climbing harnesses and ropes, climbing anchors, and whatever else we decided to bring. That meant our blades, guns, and anything we could carry. I noted that Duncan had chosen a long gun, no doubt with armor-piercing bullets that would act like cold iron on Fae creatures. Camille equipped us with special cave radios that transmitted using low frequency waves that would allow us to stay in communication with those above ground. Unless there was something magical to dampen the field, we could stay in contact the entire time.
We squeezed into the tiny, open metal box that served as the elevator, women in front and men in back. I noticed that Elryn had her hand on her short sword’s hilt. I would’ve done the same with the Vorpal blade, but that meant me getting too close and personal to Duncan, and neither of us really wanted to entertain that thought. As we rode down the elevator in near darkness, I found myself feeling a bit claustrophobic packed in like a sardine can in an elevator I had little to no trust in. I took a deep breath as the elevator, with its loud gears and creaky cables, gave a good jolt and started down the long shaft.
The Police song Canary in a Coal Mine replayed over and over in my brain. Yes, you can thank me for that little earworm. If I had to suffer, so do you. As we trundled down, the cool air grew warmer. The warmer
air became stifling and I watched the rock walls that dripped with condensation slide past in our headlights glow. The lights on the maintenance elevator were sparse—not quite nonexistent, but not really useful. When we finally lumbered to a stop, Camille pushed the safety rail
“Let’ perform a radio check.” Camille ran a radio check between her radio, our radios, and the above ground radios. Luna’s normally cheery, now rough from the partial transformation informed us that she could hear us clearly.
I clipped the radio to my belt, once more glad that I hadn’t been afflicted by the technology problems certain wizards have. Not all wizards are plagued with anti-tech fields; those who have technology problems are usually wizards with nature-based powers. One wizard I know of in Chicago has it bad; he even drives an ancient Volkswagen Beetle because just about everything else is too complex or has silicon attached. Oddly enough, even though I’m descended from druids on my mom’s side, I got the iron magic, and subsequently technomagic, from my dad’s side. But if anyone on that side liked being underground, I didn’t inherit any of that. I stood, taking deep breaths of the too-warm air in the hopes that I wouldn’t have to use my asthma inhaler.
“You okay?” Duncan asked.
“Yeah, fine.” I took another deep breath and looked at Elryn. If the Light Elf was uncomfortable underground, she didn’t look it. That surprised me. Of course, it might be just her poker face, even though she had a hard time concealing her displeasure at Beau Jo’s. Still, I walked up to her as she looked at a map someone had somehow affixed to the dripping walls. It looked a lot more detailed than what the visitor’s center had.
“We’re here.” She pointed at what was apparently the maintenance shaft. “And we’ve got to get here.” She pointed to a tunnel below us marked Argo Tunnel. “But I don’t see the shaft that connects the two.”
“Here.” Camille stood on tiptoes to run her finger along what looked like a barely navigable shaft. “Back when they were mining, these shafts were nearly underwater, even with the Argo Tunnel. But nowadays the water level has receded and as long as we don’t mine deeper, these tunnels aren’t flooded.”
“Good to know,” Duncan remarked. “Are you sure we can fit in that shaft going to the Argo?”
“It’s narrow, but our maintenance guys, who are bigger than you, have gotten through,” Camille said. “But you have to be limber.”
I looked over the shaft we were in with my magical sight. Magical sight allows you to see magic and auras of living things. It’s not a particularly hard skill—many Normals have it—the trick is to be able to keep the magical sight up long enough to see magic and living creatures. Not surprisingly, vampires and other undead don’t have auras and can become tricky to detect. But if you have the right magic, you can see them too.
Unfortunately, that was beyond my current training. Wizardry Today magazine promised to have a piece about seeing undead auras in the next issue. As a Denver Police Department Supernatural Unit (DPDS) cop and a newly accepted member of the Denver Wizard Task Force (DWTF), I had a good shield spell, a great light orb spell, and a kick-ass fireball spell. Beyond that, most of my magic had either been on the fly by mashing Latin words together, or a spell I got online or from one of the many wizarding magazines. (Almost all the wizards, except the technomages, eschew the Internet and actually still print their magazines on paper.)
In other words, even though I saved humankind, I wasn’t a powerful wizard. If it hadn’t been for Elryn, Tuzren, and Luna, I’m pretty sure the whole planet would be overrun with Drow and Dwarves.
I was feeling dreadfully inadequate now in the however many hundreds of feet below the surface we were. Looking around, I half expected the not-so-little demon to pop in and announce he found everyone and they’re fine. But Tuzren was probably waiting for us at the Argo Tunnel like I told him to. Using my magical sight, I saw nothing save lichen growing on the wet walls of the tunnel and the auras of the people around me. Duncan’s was blue like mine (must be a cop thing), Elryn’s was green, and Camille’s was pinkish. Nothing else save a faint yellow-green glow from the lichen.
“Let’s get going.” Duncan loaded his rifle with a resounding clack and I gripped the Vorpal blade’s hilt. “Lead on, Camille.”
~ * ~
Camille led us with the assurance of a spelunker. I kept switching between magical sight and normal sight, which gave me a headache and required my eyes to readjust to the darkness again. I ran into Elryn once; the second time, she lifted a foot which caught me hard in the groin. After picking myself off the ground, I decided that maybe using my magical sight wasn’t a good idea and didn’t bother switching.
As we walked, we heard scratching and skittering, but when we focused our beams where we heard the noise, we saw nothing. I tried to see something with my magical sight, but nothing showed up on my magical radar, so to speak.
“There shouldn’t be anything down here?” I whispered to Camille after our third stop to see what was making the noise.
“Not this far down.” Camille’s furrowed brow told me everything I needed to know. “There’s nothing for them to eat down here or make a nest with.”
I nodded. I glanced at Elryn who looked angry. “Something wrong?” I whispered to her.
“I’m sensing something, but I’m not sure.” I could see by the set of her jaw and her hardened eyes she took it personally she couldn’t figure it out.
“Drow?” Duncan suggested.
“No, something else.” She stared at the walls and shook her head. “You’re not seeing anything, Ironspell?”
“No, nothing.” I hated admitting that I was as clueless as everyone else. “Camille, how far is it to the shaft?”
“Not far.” Despite the heat, Camille rubbed her arms as though she were cold. “I don’t like this. It feels wrong.”
“Let me do a radio check.” I keyed the mike. “Hey Luna, do you copy?”
Nothing.
“Luna, I need a radio check.”
Silence.
A feeling of dread washed over me. I glanced at the other three, who tried their cave radios. Nothing.
Suddenly, a bony hand reached out of the ground and grabbed Camille’s leg. The girl screamed and tried to run as the hand became an arm and then a skull, vertebrae, and shoulders formed out of the dirt where nothing had been before.
“Mine lich!” Elryn shouted and just as abrupt, we had mine liches coming up through the ground at all of us. One grabbed my leg, clamping down as if it were iron manacles. I drew the Vorpal blade and slammed it into the undead’s neck, cleaving it from its head. I turned around as the arm loosened and shots rang out. Duncan blasted the heads off the liches that came after him. Elryn was going on the offensive, hacking and slashing the liches with her short sword.
Camille wasn’t as lucky. The lich had her in its grasp and it began pulling her down into the ground. I charged and slammed the sword across the lich’s bony arms. I grabbed her and pulled, but something held her fast in the ground.
“Help me!” she screamed, her eyes wide with terror. Arms came out of the ground and grasped at her.
I pointed at her “Subvolo!” Camille screamed as unseen hands tried to lift her out of the ground. The liches grasped onto her and thus began a magical tug-of-war.
Elryn spoke some words in Elvish and vines grew up around us and wrapped themselves tightly around the girl. They pulled upward along with my spell. Camille screamed again and we all watched in horror as the skin melted away from her bones and the earth swallowed her body. Nothing was left; not even a mark in the ground where she had been taken.
“Run!” Elryn shouted. We didn’t need any further encouragement. I leapt over the grasping hands, using the Vorpal blade to slice through. Duncan’s rifle rang out, blasting bone and sending a shower of grisly bits over us.
“Get going!” I turned and shouted, “Globus ignis!” I threw a ball of magical fire at our attackers. My fireball spell acted like napalm and stuck to the unde
ad it hit, burning them as they ran after us.
“Great,” Duncan panted as I caught up to him. “Now we’re being chased by flaming skeletons.”
He had a point. Tuzren, I concentrated, using as much magic as I could muster. We could use some help now.
If the demon heard me, he didn’t acknowledge. That meant one of three things. It meant that Tuzren had found the people and were protecting them against the Dark Elves, he had his hands full and couldn’t respond, or he couldn’t respond. I hoped for the first scenario and didn’t want to think about the third. If something could overpower Tuzren in his supersized state, there was no way we could take it on.
We almost missed the shaft we needed to take. Elryn, as usual, was on her game and found it first. I tossed a barrage of fireballs toward the oncoming undead and Duncan shot out any that came too close.
“Hang on.” Elryn closed her eyes and chanted something in Elvish. Suddenly, the floor came alive with grass and flowers. Large trees and vines sprung up from the ground and encircled us and the shaft entrance. Duncan’s eyes grew big as he watched the amazing display of power.
Elryn sagged and nearly collapsed, but I caught her before she hit the ground. “That will keep us safe long enough to get through.”
She felt like a wet mop in my arms. “Damn it, Elryn, don’t overdo your powers.”
She looked up at me, her gray eyes showing her exhaustion. “Just need more food.”
“Imagine what you could do if you ate Beau Jo’s pizza instead of salad,” I chided.
She snorted. “It won’t last long—it’ll degrade as they claw their way into it. It does buy us some time, though. Give me a few minutes to recuperate.”
Duncan handed her an energy bar and she ate it with a few swigs of bottled water she kept in the pack she had on. “I can see why you brought her,” the cop said.
“Yeah, she comes in handy in a fight.” I sighed. “I wonder where Tuz is.”