A Prince's Errand

by Dan Zangari

  The statues lined the road on either side and led to the mountains—no, a building carved from the mountain. Its architecture was unlike the rest of Dalgilur, comprising sharp designs that resembled the curve of a claw. The building protruded from the mountainside and towered as high as the seven structures at Dalgilur’s heart, but it was many times wider. It seamlessly blended into the mountainside.

  “By Heleron’s Fin…” Cornar said, his mouth agape as he gazed at the massive structure.

  A towering portico was aligned with the road, rising what Cornar assumed was dozens of stories. In all truth, the portico could have been taller. Everything about the colossal structure was larger than it should have been. Was it exaggerated like that to accommodate… a dragon? But dragons weren’t real.

  Igan and Kamdir continued talking as Cornar stepped across the platform. Cornar was drawn toward the colossal structure. Something compelled him there, though he didn’t know what.

  “Cor?” Igan called.

  Cornar replied without turning around. “Let’s go in there.”

  * * * * *

  Krindal fought the urge to dash across those manicured fields. He paced uneasily along the pier. His cohorts who hadn’t joined Cornar’s warriors were busily examining the pier, debating its nature.

  “It has to be barsion,” Timar said.

  “No,” retorted Pectis, “there could be a form of kinetic stabilization.”

  “Don’t be stupid, Pectis,” Claur said, grumbling. “If there was kinetic manipulation, there would be ripples in the water.”

  Krindal couldn’t stand the bickering any longer. He hurried away, searching for the prince. Krindal had to know why he was forbidden to go into Dalgilur. Did Prince Kaescis fear the accursed elves were lying in wait? Perhaps Cornar and his men were fodder. Yes, that had to be it.

  Commands resounded through the air, and Krindal found the prince still aboard the Executor’s Breath. Krindal pushed through the crowd of sailors and soldiers and climbed the gangway.

  “Your Imperial Highness,” he called. “Is it time yet?”

  “Patience, Krindal,” Prince Kaescis said. “I have received specific instructions and we must adhere to them.”

  That stupid religion, Krindal grumbled. The prince’s adherence to that frivolous Will he followed was downright frustrating. Krindal must have been making a face because Prince Kaescis sternly raised an eyebrow at him.

  “Don’t say it, Kaescis,” Laeyit said, putting a hand on the prince’s shoulder. She gently stroked his sleeve. “He is not a believer.”

  Of course I’m not a believer, Krindal groaned. I’m a damned scholar, and I deserve to be out there! He turned, facing the towering buildings across the island.

  Krindal would have taken Cornar’s offer, but the threat the prince had made was more compelling than Krindal’s curiosity.

  “Your Will—or whatever you call it—better not deprive me of discoveries,” Krindal groaned.

  “It won’t be much longer,” Kaescis said. “Why don’t you come dine with us? I doubt any of us have eaten since we entered the storm.”

  Krindal heard the prince and his small retinue walk away. Food was appealing. It was better than listening to squabbles.

  * * * * *

  Nordal decided to explore one of the outer buildings in Dalgilur. There were plenty of people looking for a spot for the damned Tilters to set up their lopsided war camp. Nordal actually hated that war camp. Its memory left a bitter taste, and that bitterness extended to everything Mindolarnian.

  A little exploration would counter that distaste. Besides, the Tilters had forsaken Cor on Klindala, so they deserved a little forsaking. The other two didn’t mind being disobedient. Tinal was an eager fellow, ready for adventure. The young wizard hadn’t been out much and acted like a boy who had never left his homeland—well, maybe on rare occasion. And Midar, well, he was just as eager as Nordal to make a discovery for themselves.

  This adventure had been quite dull. They had done little exploring in Klindil. The trek had practically been boring, except for the earthquake. Then everything after that became absurd. Not even the Keepers’ Temple could be considered exploration.

  So, Nordal decided to take things into his own hands. After separating from Cor and the others, Nordal took his trio around the right side of Dalgilur. They passed six of those towering buildings and then reached the mountainside. The road kept going, arcing in a circle. The mountainside was cut cleanly along the road’s edge, forming a polished brown wall.

  According to the map, there would be five other buildings tucked along the mountains. But, Nordal thought this one where the mountain was cut would be easy to remember, especially since all these buildings looked alike.

  There were at least three entrances on the structure’s eastern side. They approached the one in the center, and the door slid aside as Nordal and the others neared. It must have reacted to their presence.

  A peculiar freshness of air washed from the opening. It was like the rooms in the Keepers’ Temple. The mages thought the air was purified, but Nordal thought it stank. Fresh air was pure, not this nonsense.

  They stepped inside, entering a narrow hallway. A narrow strip of light along the ceiling illuminated the hall. It looked like coursing magic. There was also a slight hum in the air. The interior of the building was sleek, like everything else they had encountered on the island. Nordal had expected to find flowery details, gaudy décor, and lavish furniture. But none of that was here. It was just, sleek.

  “Different than I imagined,” Tinal said somberly. The young wizard studied every bit of the hall.

  “I wonder where this hallway goes…” Midar said, cautiously shifting his sword in his grip.

  “Hopefully somewhere worthwhile,” Nordal said, striding down the hallway.

  “And if it doesn’t?” Tinal asked.

  Nordal glanced to the young wizard, raising his brow. “The one thing you must always remember about adventuring, Tinal, is that a whole lot of nothing leads to something.”

  “Unless it doesn’t,” Midar said flatly. “And then you’ve just wasted your time.”

  Nordal rolled his eyes and continued down the hallway.

  * * * * *

  The portico was at least twenty stories tall, or so Cornar assumed. He wondered if that height had something to do with the Keeper Orders. But why would someone build a structure in such an exaggerated fashion? He kept coming back to the idea that it was constructed for a dragon… but dragons weren’t real.

  They couldn’t be.

  Colossal doors barred the way. The doors were massive stone slabs that bore glyphs for each of the Keeper Orders.

  “Well, I doubt we can get in this way…” Kamdir sighed.

  “Maybe there is a smaller door that opens,” Igan wondered. “Or a keyword that activates the tevisrals that will move these.”

  Cornar continued forward, leaving his companions behind to debate the colossal slabs. As Cornar neared the doors, light shone from between the massive stone slabs; it was a brilliant white that forced Cornar to shield his eyes. Then, creaking noises resounded from the light.

  The massive doors swung across the ground, arcing just in front of Cornar.

  “Proximity,” Igan said, striding past Cornar into the now open doorway.

  The room that lay beyond could not be described as massive. Massive failed to describe the grandeur of this room. It rose as high as the portico and was several times wider than it was tall. The depth seemed to go on and probably was as long as Dalgilur’s city was round.

  Columns—that could have been buildings—held up the ceiling. Their diameter wasn’t as thick as the structures outside, but the columns looked large enough to fit several large homes within them. Cornar thought he saw windows lining the massive columns. There were eight of these columns, each spaced apart farther than a city block.

  Stonework the size of a road lined the ceiling, creating supports for shallow domes between each
of the pillars and the outside walls. Polished coned crystals the size of buildings hung from the apexes of each of those domes, with more stonework wrapped around the crystals. The crystals’ tips, however, stopped short of reaching the tops of the columns.

  Wide corridors as tall as the ceiling lined the halls, aligned with the central domes.

  “This place looks like it was made for a giant…” Kamdir muttered.

  Igan grinned, chuckling softly. “I think we found a suitable spot,” the wizard said.

  They strode through the enormous chamber. Doors stood at the bases of the columns. Perhaps those are buildings, Cornar mused. That only furthered his confusion about this place. Why build something so colossal and then make buildings out of its pillars? It seemed a waste of space.

  Unless it was for a dragon, the thought came to him. Cornar struggled with that reasoning as they walked.

  “Look,” Kamdir said, pointing to the towering corridors. “There are some shorter hallways beside it.” The young warrior hurried away and Igan chased after him.

  Cornar trailed behind them, watching Kamdir approach the normal-sized hallway. Kamdir and Igan stopped at the entrance, looking back and forth. They were probably as confused as Cornar.

  “This is amazing, Cor!” Kamdir exclaimed, looking like an excited child. “It has exactly the same details as this huge room, just scaled down to our size.”

  Igan was grinning. The wizard nodded, then looked to Cornar.

  “What are you smiling at?” Cornar asked, partially in jest. Igan burst into laughter.

  “I wonder why they look so similar,” Kamdir observed, rubbing his chin.

  The wizard continued laughing for a moment, then quelled his outburst. “I think we found a dragon lair, Cor.”

  “No!” Kamdir exclaimed, gasping. “Really?” His eyes went wide.

  Cornar folded his arms, not amused. Was this really a dragon’s lair? That was one explanation for it… They could uncover this place’s true nature later.

  “Let’s mark this room,” Cornar said, turning away from the normal-sized hall, “and head back to the heart of the city. Unless anyone has found anything bigger—which I doubt they did—this will most likely become our campsite.”

  “It didn’t take long for men to begin worshiping Cheserith and his most loyal followers. After all, he came as a benefactor.”

  - From The Thousand Years War, Part I, page 25

  The Mindolarnian war camp was set up within a few hours. This place, the Hall of the Guardians as Krindal had learned, was enormous beyond comparison. The very room proved his theories true. The ancient Kaldeans had to have been magnificent craftsmen to create a space as grand as this.

  Several of Krindal’s fellow scholars had busily taken measurements of the place. It was seven hundred and fifty phineals wide, with a depth of almost a grand-phineal-and-a-half deep—exactly fourteen hundred and twenty phineals.

  Krindal had discovered that each of the tower-like columns housed dwellings—three on each level to be precise. The columns were seventy-five phineals in diameter and were spaced two hundred and fifty phineals apart from each other. There wasn’t the slightest deviation in distance between them. Each column was also one hundred and sixty phineals tall, the equivalent of twenty-one stories. Krindal hadn’t ventured to their tops, but a few of Cornar’s men had made the climb with Jahevial.

  While the other scholars spread about in search of tevisrals, Krindal lingered in one of the lower-level dwellings. He made a discovery that might have seemed mundane.

  But it wasn’t to him.

  Krindal stood in a room that resembled a kitchen, fiddling with a flat surface on the wall. He swept his hand over a glowing blue circle the size of his thumb. Suddenly, the light from the ceiling dimmed, and then winked out completely. Another swipe caused the light to return.

  The light above him didn’t come from a lightstone. Magic coursed through the ceiling and was the source of the illumination. Every time Krindal swiped his hand, the magic reacted. If the room was lit, the magic would retreat to where the walls and ceiling met. If it were dark, the magic would flood from that same place.

  Though it was a simple thing, the entire process overwhelmed his mind with wonder. Had the ancient inhabitants of this place ever lit a candle, or burned a lantern? Such practices were foundational to him, and the very idea of never learning how to perform such tasks made Krindal tremble in fear.

  Sliding your hand across the wall seems silly, Krindal thought, dimming the lights. I could never get used to this. He swiped his hand again, illuminating the room.

  After a while, Krindal stepped away from the odd contraption and moved to an empty basin. What is this? Krindal wondered, extending his hand. Suddenly, water shot upward from behind the basin, falling in a narrow arc.

  The water hit his hand and Krindal started at its appearance. Where had the water come from? Was this actually water? Or was it the formation of magic into water? He couldn’t tell.

  Krindal pulled his hand back, and the water flow ceased.

  I wonder, he thought, extending his hand over the basin. The water resumed flowing.

  Krindal tested the basin as he did the glowing circle. The stream of water turned on and off based on his hand’s proximity to the basin.

  Eager to make further discoveries, Krindal rummaged through the kitchen. He touched what he assumed to be a cabinet. It opened oddly; the door hovering away from the wall. A frothy breeze misted into the room, causing a sudden chill. Soon, a frozen closet lay before him. Several racks, spaced a phineal apart from one another, lined the entire length of the closet. Each rack was empty, and Krindal wondered why one would need a freezing closet.

  The cold became irksome. He grabbed the door to shove it in front of the biting chill, but was met with resistance. The door began to move on its own, slower than Krindal wanted.

  “What manner of tevisrals power this dwelling?” Krindal wondered aloud as the door settled back into place.

  Krindal found more unique things in the kitchen, obviously tevisrals he knew nothing about. Some were small and others were large. But each looked to be used for cooking.

  He wandered through the dwelling for a while, noting odd devices. His eyes, however, were drawn to a collection of books. The books were odd, like the ones found in the Keepers’ Temple. The pages were smooth, with no trace of dust. Krindal wondered if the pages could repel the decaying filth… but then he saw there was no dust around.

  How could a place such as this be dustless? That question gave him pause, but after a while Krindal resumed his search.

  Hours later, a Mindolarnian soldier came for Krindal. “His Imperial Grace requests your presence,” the soldier said. “He is holding a feast in honor of discovering this place.”

  Though he heard the summons, Krindal was consumed with the tevisral in his hand. It was a round disk with a shallow dome half the size of his palm. Numbers lined its circumference, with three arms sweeping across the numbers at various speeds. Krindal had seen similar devices in the world—things used to measure the passage of time. But they were all mechanical and much larger. This tiny thing seemed to be powered by magic.

  “Master Krindal?” the soldier asked.

  “Tell him I’ll be there,” Krindal said, eyeing the time-telling tevisral. The soldier stalked off, leaving Krindal alone.

  “Quite extraordinary,” Krindal whispered. It was the simple things that made Dalgilur’s discovery worthwhile. Everything in this one dwelling had the potential to change Kaldean life forever. Krindal could alter the world drastically with these small tevisrals.

  If all that was in this one dwelling were spread across the world, the next generation of children would never learn how to light a lantern, or dust a bookshelf. The thought scared him. Though humanity would lose something, it would gain so much more. Sacrifices had to be made for progress. Tucking the time-telling tevisral in his pocket, Krindal wandered through the dwelling, basking in its brillia
nce.

  Krindal eventually made it back to the enormous chamber. A banquet hall had been erected outside the war camp. It was set up much like the officers’ mess deck on the Executor’s Breath.

  Prince Kaescis—dressed in his royal garb—sat at the head table with his royal retinue, facing another table with strange objects piled on top of it. Some were glowing, and Krindal thought them to be tevisrals.

  Beyond the table holding the tevisrals were seven rows of tables and chairs. Soldiers, scholars, sailors, and members of Cornar’s band sat together, conversing about the wondrous discoveries they had made.

  The prince beckoned with a wave, and Krindal moved around the outer edge of this makeshift banquet hall. Each of the ship captains were seated near the prince, as with the commanders of the army. The Wildmen ambassadors—Gevistra and his sister, Fenia—sat at the table’s edge. They looked awestruck at their surroundings. Krindal had barely interacted with them during the voyage. He heard they had cowered in their quarters, afraid of being on the ocean.

  Krindal thought it odd that they would be afraid of something so simple, so mundane—but then Krindal realized where the Wildmen had come from. They had lived in a primitive nomadic society. Their stepping onto a ship would be akin to Krindal entering Dalgilur. The Wildmen were to him as he was to the Ancient Keepers.

  That notion gave Krindal pause. Amid his reverie, Krindal found an empty seat beside Cornar. Krindal still felt unsettled around the man. He admired the warrior because of his fame, but also feared him because of the deceit used to bring him along on this adventure.

  “Did you find anything worthwhile?” Cornar asked in a disinterested voice. The warrior didn’t look at Krindal directly. Cornar was gazing across the enormous chamber.

  “I… I did,” Krindal answered. “I have my proof. Our ancestors lived in ways totally alien to us.” He slipped out the time-telling tevisral, setting it on the table beside Cornar’s plate.