The Savage Realms

by Willard Black

Chapter Seventy-Six

  Stars twinkled in a vast empty vault overhead. They all agreed they needed to find shelter. Now that the sun had gone down, the temperature would plummet, and without a fire, they would freeze to death. So they picked their way across the deserted city toward the towering monolith at the center as fast as they dared go. Mercer walked with his axe in one hand and Cinder clutched her sword in her mittens. They passed several buildings of stone, crusted in ice. The long low frames were built for cold weather, with small doors that required Cinder to duck and windows that were just portholes; the stout wood shutters had been ravaged by time and the elements. Most of the doors had rotted away completely.

  Near the center of the frozen town they stopped in front of the towering spire of stone. The doorway was a yawning mouth that opened onto blackness. Long blue fingers of ice hung from the arch, and the steps were layered in frost. A door of banded iron and aging timbers was split and hung from twisted hinges.

  “Someone or something has been here,” Drake said.

  Mercer nodded. “Saves us the trouble of bashing the door down ourselves.”

  He planted his feet carefully on each ice-covered step and stuck his head through the door. “Darker than a politician’s heart,” he announced. “Can’t see a thing.”

  Cinder helped Drake up the steps, going slow so he didn’t slip, and when they reached the top he produced a small ball of light big enough to throw some illumination around the entryway. Beyond the doors lay a vast empty chamber of bare rock. The ceiling was held aloft by stout pillars and the stone floor was marked by deep gouge marks. On the far side of the great hall was a sweeping stair that led to the upper floors. They crowded inside, eager to be out of the bitter wind.

  Cinder lit her own globe of white. The shimmering ball came to life in her palm without effort, and she inspected one of the cuts in the stone floor at her feet. A shiver ran up her spine. “What do you think made these?”

  Mercer shook his head. “Don’t know. And I’m pretty sure I don’t want to know.”

  Drake nodded in agreement.

  “Go easy on the magic,” Mercer said. “We don’t know what’s waiting for us.”

  “I haven’t picked up anything,” Drake said.

  “All the same.” Mercer waved to an open door on their right. “Let’s see if we can find a smaller room to light a fire in.”

  They crossed to the door and found a stair leading down into the depths of the castle. None of them were eager to plumb the dark basements, so they crossed the chamber and mounted the steps to the upper levels. As they reached the top of the stairs, they heard a loud exhale of wind from somewhere overhead and all three stopped.

  Drake looked up at the ceiling. “Sounded like an earthquake.”

  “Or stone settling,” Mercer said.

  Cinder shook her head. “Sounded like something breathing.”

  Again came the rushing sound, but none of them could agree on what it sounded like. They stood at the top step for a good ten minutes, listening, but didn’t hear the sound again. After a while, Mercer waved them forward. They passed along a broad corridor, up another winding stair, along a twisting path, and found a small chamber with a narrow window that looked northeast across the abandoned city.

  Cinder stepped to the slit in the masonry and narrowed her eyes against the draft. Beyond the snow-piled rooftops, she spied a stone jetty and a shimmering black ocean with slabs of blue ice floating on the waters. The scene was lit by an aurora borealis. Shimmering green and blue streaks hovered over the sea like elven fire. “Beautiful view.”

  Mercer and Drake were already busy building a fire from oil given to them by Ven and dry tender. Mercer said, “Close the shutter before we freeze.”

  Cinder started to swing the heavy wood slats shut and stopped. Her brow narrowed and her mouth turned down at the corner. She gazed across the black waters at a moving dot amid the slabs of ice.

  “What are you waiting for?” Mercer grumbled. “Close the shutter.”

  “Come look,” Cinder told him.

  He struck flint with his axe blade and gently coaxed the flames to life before stepping over to the window. “I’ll be damned.”

  “What is it?” Drake wanted to know.

  “A ship,” Mercer told him.

  Drake straightened up and hobbled to the gap for a look. Cinder moved aside to give him room. While she watched, the small dot materialized into a ship the size of a child’s toy from this distance. It moved slowly through the fields of ice, getting bigger with each passing moment, until they could make out the tattered sails and rigging. The gunwales were coated in icicles and the heavy prow plowed through smaller slabs, breaking up the frost as it made way toward the jetty.

  “Pirates?” Cinder asked.

  Mercer shook his head.

  “It’s a transport,” Drake croaked.

  She turned to him. “You mean . . .?”

  He nodded. “We can log out from here. That ship will take us back to the Real.”

  While they watched, the ship bumped up against the stone jetty, and there it stayed for several minutes. Then, without aid of a crew, it set off again.

  “I don’t understand,” Cinder said. “If you can log out from here, can’t you log in to here? Why hasn’t anyone logged into the expansion, sailed right to the tower, and claimed the ten million Byte?”

  “Wherever you log out from, that’s where you’ll log back in,” Mercer explained. “All new players log in at Tanthus. They would have to reach the north and log out from here before they could log in and arrive back here.”

  The ship was dwindling into the distance now. They watched it go, and then Cinder swung the heavy shutter closed. She asked, “If we find the ten million Byte and then sail out on the boat?”

  “Automatically deposited into our bank accounts,” Mercer told her. “Minus taxes and server fees.”

  “Then all we have to do is find the coin,” Cinder said.

  They hunkered around the small fire, warmed their hands and feet, then made what supper they could out of dried deer meat, fruit, and cheese. The wind howled around the walls of the castle and beat at the shutters, but the meagre fire managed to push back the worst of the cold. Drake swigged several shots from his flask, stretched out next to the blaze, and nodded off to sleep.

  Cinder shivered and rubbed at her arms. Even wrapped in her furs and sitting up close to the flame, she still felt chilled to the bone. The only way to get properly warm would be to actually light herself on fire, and she doubted even that would be enough.

  “Cold?” Mercer asked.

  “Freezing,” Cinder told him. “You?”

  He nodded and then cocked his head. “Come on over.”

  Cinder scooted across the floor. He opened his cloak and wrapped her in it. She leaned her head on his shoulder, enjoying the warmth of his body. His hands settled around her slender waist, hugging her tight.

  “Not long now,” she whispered.

  Mercer agreed with a nod. “Suppose you’ll be taking the transport back to the Real once we’ve found the money.”

  “Won’t you?”

  He shrugged. “Fastest way to get the money safely into the bank,” he thought out loud. “Certainly better than marching it south to Citadel. Too much could go wrong with that plan, and I’ve never seen ten million Byte before, but I have to assume it’s a backbreaking load. What about after? Will you log back in? Or stay in the Real?”

  Cinder hesitated. “I haven’t decided. What about you? What’s the first thing you’re going to do with all that money?”

  “I’ve been saving up for prosthetics.”

  “Legs?” Cinder asked.

  He inclined his head.

  After a minute she asked, “How bad is it?”

  “Lost everything from the knees down.”

  “Is that why you came to the Realms?”

  “I can’t work and there’s not much you can do without legs,” he told her. “The Realms is t
he only place I can make a living and have a mostly normal life.”

  “I’m sorry,” Cinder said.

  “Don’t be,” he said. “If we find the ten million, I’ll be able to afford the best pair of prosthetics on the market. I’ll finally walk again in the Real, all because of you.”

  Cinder gripped his hand and gave it a squeeze. She thought about the dance they had shared together and couldn’t believe that the legs he had used didn’t really exist. They had been blown off. He was moving around on digital legs that only existed in the Realms, the product of a computer processor. It occurred to Cinder that she had never actually touched him, never really danced with him, wasn’t really holding him now. She was lying on a bed in a server station, probably on the other side of the country. To Cinder, here and now, that’s the part that didn’t seem real. It felt like a dream of a former life. This was her reality.

  “I’d like to see that,” Cinder said. “I’d like to see you walk on your new legs for the first time.”

  He thought about it before saying, “I live in Milwaukee.”

  “I’m in Saint Louis.”

  “You’re going to have to come to me,” he said. “Because flying in a wheelchair is a giant pain in the ass.”

  “Deal,” she said.

  He cupped her cheek, turned her face up to his, and kissed her. Cinder thrilled at the feeling of his lips pressed against hers. He gathered her into his arms and their mouths melded together.

  When it finally ended, Cinder said, “Isn’t this the part where you try to convince me the best way to stay warm is skin to skin?”

  A grin turned up one side of his face. “With Drake sleeping four feet away?”

  She took his hand and laced her fingers together with his. “Just as well. If it happens, I want the first time to be real.”

  “Even with a guy who’s missing his legs?”

  She put a finger over his lips and then smothered him with kisses.

  Chapter Seventy-Seven

  Night seemed to last forever this far north. The wind continued to howl and beat at the castle walls, rattling the window shutter in the frame and jerking Cinder from a fitful sleep. She laid curled up in Mercer’s arms. He sat with his back against the wall and his chin on his chest. Twice they heard the loud rushing noise overhead. It pulled them all from sleep and they would sit, listening intently for a while before settling back into their uneasy rest. When Cinder woke again, the fire had burned down, and a pale light poured into the room around gaps in the shutter. Drake was sitting up, watching them with a pinched expression on his face. He blinked and looked away when he realized Cinder was awake. The moment unsettled her. She didn’t like the look in his eyes, but she let it go. They were all tired, on edge. It had been a long, weary journey. She yawned and sat up. The movement woke Mercer.

  He cleared his throat, peeled open his eyes, and stretched.

  “We made it,” Drake said. He spun the cap off his flask and sipped. “Do your calculations tell you where the money is from here?”

  Cinder nodded and pointed to the ceiling, indicating the upper reaches of the sprawling fortress. Drake glanced up, like he could see through the floors to the top.

  “Just as well,” he said. “I wasn’t looking forward to another dungeon crawl through dark tunnels. At least we’ll be able to see.”

  “What do you think is up there?” Cinder asked.

  Mercer shrugged. “Can’t say. Whatever it is, it will be big and unpleasant.”

  Drake agreed, but he reached into his pack and pulled out the large crystal he had used at Loudwater to scry on the trapped miners. “One way to find out.”

  “Will it give away our presence?” Mercer asked.

  Drake considered that. “Depends on what’s up there. If it’s something with a lot of magical power, like a beholder, then yes. But our only other option is walking in blind.”

  “How long do you need?” Cinder asked.

  “Give me an hour,” Drake told them.

  He set to work, making ready by placing the crystal on the ground before him and pulling several components from his gear. Cinder felt the room come alive with the low buzz of electricity. While Drake prepared to use the scrying stone, Mercer and Cinder went exploring, mostly as an excuse to be alone. They investigated the empty chambers and twisting passages hand in hand, stopping every few minutes to trade kisses. By the time they returned, Drake was staring deep into the crystal, one hand hovering over the stone and sweat trailing down his face into his scraggly beard.

  Looking over his shoulder, Cinder could see images from the fortress flashing in the depth of the crystal. The picture was grainy and ethereal, like an old sepia-toned movie played on a shaky projector.

  Mercer crowded next to her, and they both watched as the vision ascended a stair, along passages, through doors, and sometimes through solid walls. Drake went floor by floor, and finally, at the very top, they caught a glimpse of their enemy.

  High above, in the tallest tower, a dragon slept curled upon a stone dais. It was the size of a delivery truck with its tail wrapped around its massive body and a head big enough to bite a man in half. Large, leathery wings were folded against the monster’s flanks, and its belly rose and fell with every breath. It was hard to be sure from the image, but the beast seemed to be pale in color, like the cold hues of the northern snows.

  Cinder drew in a sharp breath.

  “Quiet,” Drake hissed.

  The chamber where the dragon rested was open to the elements. Pillars held aloft a stone roof and snow blew into the tower, piling up around the dragon’s clawed feet and gathering in small drifts upon the floor.

  Drake tried to maneuver around the sleeping beast for a look at the rest of the chamber, but the dragon woke. One eye, the size of a car tire, peeled open and focused on them. Then the dragon unfurled itself. The massive beast rose up on its haunches and large wings spread across the chamber. Its jaw opened wide, showing a mouth full of sharp teeth. It let out an ear-splitting roar, which they heard five stories below, and ice poured from the dragon’s maw. The sound shook the fortress, raining dust from the ceiling. Cinder clapped her hands over her ears.

  The image in the crystal blotted out, then the crystal itself froze over and cracked. Drake broke the connection and lunged away with a cry of pain. The electrical charge broke with a silent pop. Frost spread out from the cracked crystal like ripples on the surface of a lake, slowly creeping across the floor.

  Mercer drew his axe and smashed the seeing orb with the blunt end of his weapon. The crystal broke into a thousand tiny shards, stopping the spreading frost, and from overhead, they heard another piercing roar.

  Drake drew a rattling breath, let it out slow, and said, “I think we pissed it off.”

  They all stared at the shattered crystal and the ring of frozen stone on the floor. Mercer said, “At least we know what we’re dealing with.”

  Cinder raked a hand through her hair. “We can’t fight that thing. It could swallow us whole.”

  “You want to turn back?” Drake asked.

  Cinder hesitated. She wanted the money, but she didn’t think they stood a chance against a dragon.

  “Too late for that,” Mercer said. “We have to kill the dragon or die trying. It knows we’re here now. It won’t just let us leave.”

  “How can we possibly fight something like that?” Cinder asked.

  “I have a few enchantments that should offer us protection from the cold,” Drake said. “There won’t be anything to protect against his bite though.”

  “How do you plan to kill it?” Cinder asked. “I don’t think your axe is going to do much good.”

  “We use fire,” Mercer said.

  Cinder’s brow creased.

  He brought out one of the flasks of oil which Ven had given them. “We have two dozen of these things. We won’t need them for the winter. There’s a ship to the Real less than a mile away. I say we use them on the dragon instead.”

 
“It could work,” Drake said.

  Before Cinder could ask what they were talking about, she heard the rush of mighty wings and a horrible shriek that sent her heart racing. Air burst into the room around gaps in the shutter and they all knew the dragon was just beyond the wall, hovering outside the narrow window. Gusts of air from massive wings beat at the shutter and snow swirled in through the chinks in the wood. There came a great rattling intake of breath, and Cinder spared one glance at the shuttered window before scrambling for the door.

  Chapter Seventy-Eight

  The dragon let out a fierce scream. It sounded like a symphony of hellish violins played by rusty razor blades and felt like needles attacking Cinder’s eardrums. She opened her mouth and let out a terrified shriek as she fled the chamber, but the sound was lost beneath the voice of the dragon. The stout wood shutter exploded off the hinges, splintering like matchsticks, and a torrent of ice burst through the opening with the force of a firehose. Frost layered the walls and ceiling and the floor turned to ice as the dragon’s breath filled the chamber. Cinder didn’t stop, didn’t look back. She leapt through the door and retreated several feet along the passageway. Mercer came next, hauling Drake by one arm and a sack full of gear in the other. Ice erupted from the chamber door in deadly shafts, like the back of some giant porcupine, barely missing Mercer as he fled the room.

  Outside, beyond the castle wall, the dragon gave one final shriek of angry defiance and then they heard the creature’s wings flapping up and away as it retreated back to its nest atop the fortress.

  Mercer put Drake down, leaned his back against the wall of the passage, and gasped for air. Drake lowered himself to the floor, shaking. Cinder approached the door to the room and gently tested one of the icy shafts with her fingertips. It was hard as rock, and the tip was lethal sharp. The entire room was one solid block of ice, wall-to-wall and floor to ceiling.

  Cinder realized she had fled without her pack. All Drake’s gear was inside the wall of ice as well, along with Mercer’s battle axe. Much of their food and supplies were trapped in the ice. Only Mercer had the presence of mind to grab his bag before escaping the freezing chamber. He reached into his pack and pulled out one of the vials of oil. “Now we have six of these.”