Path of the Traitors

by Charles E Yallowitz

  “The traps learn and adapt,” Trinity angrily mutters while crushing the remaining gems in her fist. She fires the gathered energy into the pit and kills the hissing monster within, but finds she is unable to seal the hole. “This is going to get ridiculous. I can put a bridge over here, but I’m going to run out of ideas before we reach the center. Is there any sign that the traps change as we get further along?”

  “Well, we have an arrow trap coming up and then two more pits,” Nimby answers as they walk over a bridge that rises from the earth. Grabbing a stone, the halfling juggles it while keeping his eyes on the next obstacle. “Come to think of it, this reminds me a little of a pattern path. Two pits and then arrows, which repeats like the portraits. It’s an old illusion trick that you find in ancient ruins from time to time. You’re actually walking through a hidden portal that reactivates the disarmed traps, so we would go in circles for a while. That could also explain the headache we get when we try to focus on the far end of the path.”

  “That makes sense, but it’s too early to be sure,” Quail states while turning in a circle. He takes two steps to his left and then four to his right, his eyes locked on a single point in the distance. “I’ve run into those types of traps too and they typically have a spot that you can look at without getting sick. Usually right below a person’s natural straight line of vision, which I’m not finding here. Can you set off the next trap from here, Nimby, because I want to see if anything else happens?”

  Putting the rock in a leather sling, the thief spins the weapon over his head and takes careful aim. He hesitates to account for his altered vision, which shows him a red line running across the path. Once he is sure of what he is shooting at, Nimby lets the rock fly and hits a spot that causes hundreds of arrows to burst from the portraits. Seeing that the attacks are moving along the path, the halfling raises his skeletal arm and shakes it to get the Lich’s attention. Everyone hears a tired sigh before a plume of darkness erupts from the bronze ring and engulfs the group in a dome. The projectiles harmlessly pierce the protective spell, but the travelers are left unnerved by the sight of phantasmal arrows whizzing through their bodies. All of them gasp for air when the barrier is dropped and they notice a chill that lingers in their bones until they cough up tiny bits of ice.

  “I miss casting spells like that,” the Lich says, his voice rising in pitch. Rotating his hand and wiggling his fingers, the necrocaster removes his spell from Nimby’s eyes. “It appears we have a problem. The traps have already reset. Either we have a certain amount of time to move along the path or my spell made the maze think we escaped. Does anyone have an idea on how to get through this quickly?”

  “I think I have a spell that can work,” Altia mentions as she uncoils her whip. Focusing on her necklace, she swings her weapon in a wide circle and creates a shimmering bubble around her body. “Been years since I ran into this spell, but I remember it being used for transport. All of you can step inside and then I’ll harden the outside to protect against the arrows. The only problem is that the rest of you will be floating while I’ll be the only one running to move the bubble. That can get awkward and a bit bumpy with so many people inside. Still, it beats inching along and wasting time.”

  “I swear, you people come up with the most ridiculous ideas,” Vile mutters before jumping into the spell. Floating to the top, he tries to push his hand through the membrane, but finds it impossible to break. “Once inside, we can’t get out. Very convenient for carrying prisoners or leaving someone to die. The spell even resists my swords. Impressive, but I still feel this is undignified and humiliating for a warrior such as myself.”

  “Because your current body is earning you so much respect, father,” Nimby retorts while stepping inside. He is shifted to Altia’s left and turned to face away from her, his face tingling at the touch of her magic. “I get it. We’re being put in places to be your eyes. While you focus on movement and avoiding threats ahead of us, we can check your sides and rear. Is that part of the original spell?”

  Watching the others get positioned, Altia shrugs and admits, “I think it’s only getting all of you out of my way. You’re closer to luggage than helpers in here. Now, it’s hardening the bubble and enhancing my leg muscles to make sure I can move this thing. Let’s hope this works out, especially with the pits. Honestly, I hadn’t really considered those, but too late to change the plan now.”

  Ignoring the chorus of complaints, Altia races forward and sets off the arrow trap that bounces off the bubble. The early success helps her confidence as she reaches the first pit and tries to bounce them high into the air. Vines lance out at the travelers, their curved ends snapping against the enchanted orb. A long-mouthed beast erupts from the pit and attempts to swallow them whole, but its teeth snap shut a hair away from Altia’s feet. She hits the ground running, the sound of the creature being impaled and torn apart by the vines making her shudder. Building up enough speed, the elf tries to cross the next gap by rolling along the wall. Nothing attacks them this time and they continue on their way, so she uses the tactic at every gap instead of risking another launch into the air.

  After the eighth time going through the same pattern, Altia tries to slow down and suggest a new plan. She slips on a patch of grease that appears beneath her feet, which causes her to lose control of the bubble. With a sudden burst of speed, they careen off the portraits that mockingly laugh at their plight. No longer stuck to their spots, the travelers bounce into each other and struggle to get their bearings. Altia yelps when Vile gets tangled in her hair, the figurine’s thrashing causing her pain that urges the bubble to get even faster. The maze is nothing more than streaks of muted colors as they blast along the path that no longer contains any of the previous traps.

  Hitting a mound of dirt, the orb spins into the air where a swinging blade slices it neatly in half. Quail screams at the sensation of his right foot getting sheared off, the body part flopping to the ground. Altia snags it with her whip and yanks it back into her half of the bubble in order to throw it to the chaos elf. Before she can make the toss, her spell repairs instead and the travelers find themselves divided into two orbs. They pound on the walls that absorb all spells and become foggier to prevent them from noticing the fork in the road. With the echoing sound of colliding boulders, the bubbles bounce off each other and hurtle down alternate paths. The last the two groups hear from each other is a brief shout from the Lich, whose voice ends in a gleeful chuckle.

  *****

  “We have to find them!” Altia shouts as she drags herself out of the water. Clutching Quail’s severed foot, she tries to figure out which of the eight paths they have to take to find their friends. “That’s where we came from, so they wouldn’t be that way. I think they were going off at a sharp angle, so maybe one of these two routes. The others would take us away, which could be a circular way to the others, but Quail could bleed to death by then.”

  “Stop flailing about like a brain-damaged goblin and get me out of your hair!” Vile demands, the figurine trapped in her drenched tresses. Sensing that his words have fallen on distracted ears, he frees himself along with a few hairs from the elf’s head. “You deserve that agony. I hope it snaps you back to your senses. Quail has that Troll Ring, which he said might give him healing powers. At the very least, the bleeding will stop quickly as long as he bandages it tightly. Besides, it is not like we will be able to find him before he dies from the injury. Best to focus on the happier possibility of reuniting down the road to avoid becoming a useless heap of tears.”

  “I hate the way he said it, but Vile is right,” Trinity says from where she is floating. Two sparrows dart over the maze, the vines remaining motionless instead of attacking. “Quail is with Nimby and Tyler, so he should be fine. Those two need him as a guide and they can be rather resourceful when their lives are on the line. We have the bigger problem since we don’t have a map or a mapper. Watch my body while I try to get a look around.”

  A ghost-like mask ris
es from Trinity’s face as she drifts to the shore, her feet sticking into the steaming mud. The bulk of her consciousness hovers in the sky, but all she can see are paths of fog. Cycling through various vision spells, the channeler tries to pierce the defensive shield to get even the slightest peek at the entire maze. All Trinity can pick out in the blurring images is a single route that snakes toward the center. She gets a sense of yearning whenever she focuses on the path, which makes the chaos elf believe it is a trap. Trying to go higher, the spell bumps into a wall that threatens to shred her mind unless she pulls back. Unnerved by the sensation, the channeler races back into her body and wakes up gasping for air. It takes her a second to realize her head is underwater, so she scrambles out of the pool and glares at her companions who are not paying attention to her plight.

  “That way is a trap and I’m tempted to hurl both of you down there,” Trinity says while cleaning the mud off her body. Taking Quail’s foot from Altia, the chaos elf shoves it into her pocket and presses her finger against the other woman’s forehead. “I’m not wasting time trying to console you. We need to get moving and you’re the closest thing we have to a mapper. There has to be something you learned from Quail. Do we follow the sun, which doesn’t seem to be moving at all? What about finding a breeze that will lead us somewhere? Maybe I should try a direction spell and hope it doesn’t backfire.”

  “None of the rules will work in a place like this,” Altia explains, wiping a few tears from her cheeks. Pressing her hand against the nearest portrait, she pulls away to find a thin layer of paint on her skin. “Since it was a simple fork, there is a fifty percent chance that we went the right way. The others have all of the tools to recover from a wrong turn while we have no way to know where to go. We might as well flip a coin to decide on where we go next. It’s going to be a battle no matter what.”

  “Why don’t we continue down the path we landed in?” Vile asks, pointing at the flooded route. The figurine’s eye glows at the sight of the water becoming a gelatinous ooze that burps a dark yellow gas. “Disgusting, but I don’t care. You two can smell like a heated swamp since I’ll stay on your heads.”

  Trinity fights the urge to kick the toy into the pool before walking around to stick her head into every exit. “Can we please stop being jerks to each other and focus? I’m not sensing anything that could help us. This is ridiculous. I pick this route since it looks like it goes toward the center. Unless somebody sees a clue in one of the portraits or thinks their luck is better than mine.”

  “Third from your right,” a high-pitched voice announces from the walls.

  “I am not listening to a disembodied voice.”

  “We are guides sent by the Lich.”

  “That doesn’t make me feel better.”

  “All other paths lead to death.”

  “You’re still not giving me a reason to believe you.”

  “Time is about to run out, so don’t say you weren’t helped.”

  With a whistling tune, a sparrow lands on the hedge and is promptly snatched by one of the vines. The leafy tendril starts to retract when the bird tears its way free and grabs the plant in its feet to rip it off. Flying in a circle around the intersection, the animal chirps and sings with an ear-wrenching pitch. More sparrows dive into the maze and join the first one until the travelers are surrounded by the flock. Shreds of the portraits are carried on the wind, the paintings destroyed by the tiny claws and beaks of the birds. Vines erupt from the hedges to attack the swarm, but they are devoured as quickly as they appear. The flock becomes fast enough to create gales that gradually suck the oxygen out of the intersection, which drives the travelers to their knees.

  Drawing fresh air from above, Trinity tries to combat the flock with fireballs that explode with no effect. She flings acid blasts and force bolts, which make even less of an impact than the flames. When a bolt of lightning runs between her hands, the sparrows erupt in a chorus of screeches and change direction to knock the channeler across the clearing. Feeling like she has been struck by a battering ram, Trinity coughs up a few spots of blood and staggers to her feet. A warble draws her attention to the left where the flock is speeding along the hedges. Not wanting to get hit again or torn to shreds, the chaos elf leaps away at the last second and sprints for her friends.

  “Third from our right it is,” Trinity gasps as she takes Altia by the hand. She sends a bolt of lightning at the pathway and the spell becomes a crackling door that disrupts the flock. “Run and don’t look back. Pray too if you think anyone can hear us. We can use all of the help we can get this time.”

  *****

  “Get your finger out of my leg!” Quail screams, the chaos elf smacking the skeletal limb away from him. Gripping his ankle, he takes another look at the stump that is starting to grow a thin layer of skin. “That hurts a lot and I’m having enough trouble without you aggravating the wound. Good thing my ring does something with injuries. Not sure if I’ll regenerate like a troll or the wound will just heal over.”

  “That is what I was trying to find out before you got angry,” the Lich argues while sniffing at the blood on his finger. An attempt to get Nimby to taste the ichor fails when the halfling wakes up and shakes his head clear. “Very well. You’ll live and I can reattach the foot when we meet up with the others. It won’t be perfect and could fall off again, but you will be able to run if your life depends on it. At least you aren’t bleeding to death because then we would have to explain why you aren’t with us anymore. After that, Altia would demand we go back for your body and all that other emotional nonsense.”

  “I get the sense that I should have woken up earlier,” Nimby interrupts, his face contorting when he touches a large bump on his head. Watching Quail try to stand, he walks to a nearby tree to cut down a branch. “Give me a few minutes and I can turn this into a functional crutch. It won’t be perfect or very comfortable, but it can help you walk. So, is this that central courtyard you mentioned or are we lost?”

  Using a portrait to help himself stand, Quail leans against the painting and tries his best to ignore the sensation of fingers poking his back. He finally hops to the side and falls back to the ground with nothing to help him support his weight. With a tired sigh, he pulls out the crest map and watches the picture change to show where they are. After casting a finder spell, a trio of orange dots appears in another location and steadily heads along a path that will take them to the center of the labyrinth. Quail does his best to figure out where they are since the map stubbornly refuses to show anybody who is not on the correct path. Knowing that he needs to trick the ancient document, he pulls out a compass and moves it until he finds north. Touching the map to the tool and chanting a spell, he merges their energies to create a small circle that marks where they are in the maze.

  “We took the wrong path, but I think we can still reach the center without going backwards,” Quail explains while he watches the compass spin in a circle. The arrow stops on east before the entire device rotates to accommodate the new directional system. “Looks like one of the dangers of the maze is that north isn’t always north. Seems we take that path, which will bring us to a false dead end. The portrait is a doorway of some kind and that brings us to another route that will take us directly to the courtyard. No telling how many traps are along the way, but it seems fairly easy. From what I’m seeing, there are a lot of secret doors that connect the paths, which I guess was built for loyal servants to use in case they fell into the maze. Wish I knew who or what created it because that would help me understand the mindset that went into the overall design.”

  “My guess would be Stephen since this place is too normal for Yola and the Baron would have been cursed before its creation,” Nimby replies as he finishes the crutch. Unable to find any sandpaper, he wraps one of his extra shirts around the end to protect Quail from splinters and the rough wood. “Give this a try and I’ll adjust the height. Have a feeling that I made it too long, but better that than too short. Once you’re all
set, we can head for that dead end. Leave all the traps and dangers to us.”

  “Speaking of traps, are you sure it is smart to interact with the tree?” the Lich asks, his fingers touching the sliced wood. Gently pulling back, he finds that tiny threads of black sap are clinging to his bones. “This muck holds residual aura from a very powerful creature. I can’t tell what it is due to the magic being so thin. Like trying to scry from hundreds of miles away by using a bowl of tasteless chicken broth. Yes, I speak from experience. When in the employ of a man such as Baron Kernaghan, one needs to work with what they have to avoid being seen as needy and worthless.”

  Waiting for the adjustments to finish, Quail does his best to keep his balance while holding the map. “I hope you’re wrong about the danger. That tree is between us and the way out. What if we knock it down or set it on fire? At the very least, we can distract whatever is inside long enough for us to escape.”

  “When did I ever say it was in the tree?” the Lich asks while putting a sneer on his host’s face. Digging a fingernail into the crutch, he draws out all of the dark sap to create a coating along his arm. “This is the creature’s waste, which the tree seems to have absorbed. I doubt we’re in its real lair, so maybe a depository for refuse. Not that I see anything to prove that either. Would help if I knew what we were dealing with.”

  “I vote for demon,” Nimby states as he finishes the crutch. Returning to the tree, he draws his shortsword to cut deeply into one of the roots and release a thick ooze. “This stuff reeks of demonic corruption. In fact, it reminds me of the smell coming off Luke when he was infected with the Dark Wind. I think being with you has enhanced my magical sensitivity. Wish I figured this out earlier because it’s a very handy trick. Wait a second. The ground is rather crunchy beneath the grass over here.”

  Nimby gets on his knees to pull up the emerald blades that become sharp in his hands and slice into his palms. Using a long dagger like a pick, the halfling gets through the thin layer of dirt and lifts a skull out of the earth. The mouth hangs open, but stays connected thanks to a few remaining tendons. Reaching into the hole, Nimby pulls out an arm that has been gnawed on to the point of breaking apart in his hand. Before he can grab anything else from the buried pile, a fresh batch of soil bubbles from below and covers the bodies. Grass pops out of the ground with the sound of swords being drawn from their scabbards, the edged plants remaining stiff instead of moving with the breeze.