by Eric Vall
“Thanks for noticing,” Rana said. “I was actually working on that. No promises you’ll never hear me complain again, but I managed to hold out for ten hours or so.”
“Can you do it again?” I smiled at her.
“I’ll try for you.” She winked at me, and then the three of us walked down the street away from the inn.
We soon left the town of Tarmsworth behind, crossed the stone bridge and then the field of snow, and, before long, were back in the forest.
As we trekked through the trees, I thought back to the times that Annalíse had tried to conceal her presence from her father’s soldiers in the other towns that we’d traveled to. I had yet to see the army in its entirety, but from what Annalíse and the others told me, the army under High King Ainmere was well trained. I could certainly see him sending his men in search of his only daughter, and undoubtedly, he still had plenty of soldiers to spare to defend his kingdom and carry out any other business that he needed them to.
An army of hardened mountain soldiers would be a great asset to the empire that I was building. I had already conquered Valasara, and the rebel army was at my disposal, but while they were quite skilled, their numbers weren’t great. Having the royal army of the glacial continents at my disposal would make my empire truly a force to be reckoned with.
It was only a question of who would challenge to rule: Annalíse or me?
As we made our way through the trees and frozen tundra the sun gradually rose and then started to set in the distance. As it moved across the endless horizon a vibrant array of pinks, oranges, and reds filled the sky and shone down on the twinkling snow.
My two lovers didn’t complain much during our trek across the frozen land, but when we took our midday break, they asked that I start a fire, and the three of us snuggled together under my cloak while we ate and talked. By the time we returned to the dungeon, the sun was beginning to touch the tips of the closest mountains, and the sky set in a crisp amber hue.
“Hooray! We’re back,” Carmedy called as we walked into the cavern where Morrigan and Annalíse had agreed to wait for us. The two women had built a fire in the center of the room and spread out our fur and wool blankets on the ground and had sat cross-legged chatting until we had arrived.
“Did you have any trouble?” Annalíse asked the three of us as we settled down by the fire beside them.
“Of course not.” Rana waved her paw. “Why would we? You’re the one everyone is on the hunt for, not us.”
“Yes, but the thought came to me after you left that someone may have seen us traveling together previously and word could have gotten out,” the princess pointed out. “Our group is pretty distinct you know. It’s not often that you see a human, an elf, a fox, a cat, and a man traveling together.”
“I understand what you mean,” I said to Annalíse, “but we encountered no trouble while we were in town. In fact, everyone was exceedingly kind to us.”
“They sure were.” Rana chuckled. “Are all the towns in Tamarisch like that or just Tarmsworth?”
“To my knowledge, all the towns and their people are quite pleasant as a whole.” Annalíse shrugged. “My father may be many things, but he takes good care of his people.”
“I might consider living in Tamarisch permanently,” Rana said with a sigh as she laid down on her back and folded her arms beneath her head. “I’ve never been to a place where people were that nice. They weren’t just nice to Master, they were nice to me and Carmedy too. They treated us like everyone else. No distrusting looks like they expected one of us to steal something, no hateful stares like we didn’t belong. No one called us any of those terrible names. It was nice to not be treated like a third-rate citizen.”
“Wait, did you just call him Master?” Annalíse asked as she raised an eyebrow.
“Uhhh, yeah, don’t make a big deal out of it,” the fox said.
“Okay, Mrs. ‘I’m never going to call him Master, and you three are crazy fo--’”
“Bah!” Rana groaned. “It’s fine.”
“Oh, is it?” Annalíse snickered as she glanced to me. “Sooooo, where did the three of you stay last night? There is a really nice inn with some hot springs in the basement.”
“That’s where we stayed!” Carmedy giggled. “It was so wonderful. We stayed in their best room, and we--”
“You don’t have to rub it in for them, kitty cat,” Rana interrupted. “I’m sure the Princess and the Dark Queen don’t want to hear about us taking a bath in a hot spring.”
“Oh, I’m fine,” Annalíse said as her smile grew wider and more mischievous. “So the three of you took a bath together in a private room?”
“Well, yeah,” Rana sighed.
“Then we ate a bunch of delicious food!” Carmedy sighed. “Then, I fell asleep for a bit, but Master and Rana went in the bedroom and--”
“They don’t need to know about all that!” Rana waved her hands.
“I think I can fill in the blanks,” Annalíse chuckled. “She’s calling him Master now, so--”
“It’s not at all what you think,” Rana huffed.
“Surrrrreeee,” Annalíse teased, and then she reached over to tickle the fox-girl’s tummy.
“Hey! Stop that!” Rana started to giggle, and then the two women began to mock wrestle on one of the blankets.
“I for one, and glad you both have returned safely,” Morrigan said to Carmedy and me. “This land is beautiful, but also dangerous.”
“Yep. It was really exciting to see it for the first time and see what it feels like and everything, and I love the clothes that everyone wears here.” The cat-girl nestled her face against her white fur cloak, “but it’s a bit too cold for me. I’d prefer a little warmer climate.”
“Such as Valasara perhaps?” Morrigan raised a white eyebrow with a devilish gleam in her eye.
“Not that warm.” Carmedy giggled, and the rest of us joined in her laughter.
“Oh, by the way, Annalíse,” I spoke up after the laughter had died down, “while we were in Tarmsworth, we came across some posters that were advertising the reward for your return. Not only that, we saw several soldiers in the streets questioning the citizens about your whereabouts.”
“I’m not surprised.” Annalíse sighed, and she bit into a piece of meat that she had been roasting in the fire. “My father won’t stop until I’m found. The alliance with the remaining free continent in Tintagal means everything to him, and my running away has completely halted the negotiations.”
“You don’t think those soldiers will come looking in here for you, do you?” Carmedy asked nervously. Her eyes darted to one of the tunnels as though she expected one of the warriors with the bear helmets to burst out.
“No, I don’t think so.” The swordswoman shook her head. “They’d never expect me to try to conquer a dungeon. After all, whoever heard of female adventurers?” Annalíse wryly grinned to which we all chuckled.
The five of us sat down to enjoy the meal. The talk was light, but Annalíse continued to tease Rana about calling me Master. I knew that my ice demons wouldn’t break through the walls until the middle of the next morning, so we all nestled up beside the fire and decided to call it an early night. The change in our sleeping arrangement was quite a contrast to when I first begin traveling with the four beautiful women. Back then, the four of them would position their bedrolls on the opposite side of the campfire from me, and Rana would spend most of the night eyeing me suspiciously. Now, all four women positioned their sleeping bags as close as they could to me, and the press of their blanket covered bodies around me added much warmth to the night.
The next morning, we awoke once again in the bright and gleaming cavern. We ate a quick meal, broke camp, and prepared to make our way to the next dungeon in our path. We were getting close to the High King’s castle now, that much we could tell from our maps, but we still had quite a long march ahead.
“So, how long of a trek do we have through these tunnels?” Rana aske
d as she leaned against one of the frozen walls.
“About eight hours,” I estimated.
“Oh no.” The fox woman’s face turned to a grimace. “That’s going to get really claustrophobic, and I’m all about living in dens.”
“I had them tunnel the walls wider this time,” I explained. “Their tunnels also came through various open caverns that will provide resting spots.
“Well, I guess we better get started,” the fox said. “Vacation’s over, everyone. We’ve got a long hike ahead of us.”
The group finished packing up their gear, and then they followed me through the tunnel carved out in the nearby wall. Both Rana and Annalíse held torches to help light the way, but the reflective walls of the passage my demons had cut made it possible to make the walk using only one source of light.
The women spoke in hushed voices as we talked, but the conversation was mostly Carmedy asking Rana what she wanted to name her baby, and Annalíse teasing the fox-girl about what had happened last night. It was all good natured, of course, but eventually the discussion died down, and the miles of dark tunnels passed while the five of us walked in silence. We took time for lunch in a cavern with a frozen pond in the middle, and Carmedy amused us by performing a combination of ice skating and dance moves on the polished surface. The cat-girl was quite a carefree creature, and I knew that our travels would have been darker without the joy her personality brought to the team.
“We are almost there,” I said a few hours later when we reached the end of my ice demon’s cut tunnels.
With that, my minions prepared themselves for the dungeon ahead. Weapons were drawn, gear sorted, and new torches were lit. After they had finished, I gestured for the others to follow me and plunged into the dark passageway. The tunnel was narrow enough that we had to walk single file as usual.
As we walked through the shadowy passageway, I felt a stiff breeze blow through the tunnel, and the shadows that the torches cast against the walls shuddered in response. I exhaled slowly, and the breath that emerged from my lips came out as a frosty cloud. Once again, the temperature was growing colder.
“It’s f-f-freezing in here.” Carmedy’s teeth chattered as another gust of wind blew past us and threatened to extinguish the torches.
“I did warn you that it would get colder the further we went,” Annalíse reminded the feline with a chuckle. “Actually, this isn’t that bad. For one, because we’re inside. Imagine what it would be like if we were outside. For another, it’s summer here. If you think this is cold, try traveling around here in January.”
“This is summer?” Carmedy cried out in disbelief. “That settles it, I definitely can’t live here like Rana. I’d take Valasara over this.”
“Oh stop,” Rana said with a laugh as we continued through the dark tunnel. “It’s only a little drafty in here, and it’s not even snowing.”
“Easy for you to say,” the green-eyed alchemist whined. “Say, Morrigan, how come Fea and Macha haven’t seemed cold the whole time we’ve been here? Surely their feathers aren’t enough to keep them warm in this weather.”
“They are not normal birds,” Morrigan said flatly as she stroked one of her ravens’ beaks. “They are magical creatures and are not affected by the elements in the same manner that common birds are. You may not have observed this, but throughout the duration of our travels in Valasara, Fea and Macha did not suffer from the heat as some of us did.” The elf shot a quick glance in Rana’s direction to which the fox rolled her eyes.
“I wish I could do that,” Carmedy mumbled and pulled her cloak up to her nose.
We walked in silence for another half an hour and trudged deeper and deeper toward the new dungeon. Finally, we emerged from the darkened passageway and arrived in what I knew to be the other dungeon deity’s lair. A dim white light came from somewhere up ahead to guide our way, and I gestured for my minions to ready themselves.
As Rana and Annalíse extinguished their torches, I inspected our new surroundings. The tunnel in which we had ended up was wide enough for us to walk side by side, but up ahead it opened up into a large cavern. The source of the light wasn’t from this cavern, there was another tunnel that branched off from it from which I could see the light radiating. The walls were uneven, black, and rocky, and the ceilings were fairly low, less than ten feet above my head. It seemed even closer than it was as it was covered in millions of long, finger-like icicles that twinkled whenever the light caught them.
As expected, it was a great deal colder in this dungeon. In fact, it was snowing inside this one just as it was in the first dungeon of this land. The unnatural state of it already made me wonder if this dungeon’s deity had some power over ice and snow as well. The ground was covered in almost a foot of white powder, and when a stiff wind blew through, it tossed the white flakes into the air before it settled back down. Large snowflakes fell down on our heads and dotted our fur clothing before they melted.
We walked along in silence for a few minutes as we trudged through snow when Rana finally spoke up. “It just me or did it get warmer all of a sudden?” the fox said with a suspicious look.
“You probably just feel warm because of the adrenaline,” Annalíse replied. “I feel a little warmer myself.”
“No.” Rana frowned and slowly shook her head. “I don’t mean my body feels warmer, I mean like it actually is warmer in here.”
“That is not possible,” Morrigan said calmly. “The weather cannot have shifted so abruptly. Most likely it is your mind playing tricks on you, telling you that it is warmer in order to help you cope with the frigid temperatures. Recall that Annalíse informed us all that the cold would become increasingly relentless as we journeyed on.”
“Yes, I know that she told us all that.” Rana twitched her tail in annoyance, “but there’s no way my mind is playing tricks on me or whatever. The cold isn’t that bad to me remember? I’m telling you, it definitely got warmer.”
I considered what the fox woman was saying for a few moments and focused on the air around me and the faint tingle of warmth on my skin.
“I think Rana is right,” I said at last. “I also felt a bit of warmth from the fire, but I should have cooled back down by now. It does indeed feel warmer in here.”
“How can that be?” Annalíse rubbed at her chin. “It doesn’t make any sense.”
As the female warrior spoke, I heard a faint sound in the distance from where the light was coming from. It was a slow and steady drip-drop like drops falling into a pool of water. I opened my mouth to speak when suddenly Carmedy let out a shout.
“Ugh!” the black-haired cat squealed as she shook her head vigorously.
“What is the matter?” I stepped toward the feline with a look of concern.
“Something dripped on my face,” Carmedy wiped at the area above her eyes, “and it was freezing cold too.”
The rest of us slowly raised our heads to look at the ceiling. The multitude of sharpened icicles that hung over our heads were melting, and what started as an occasional drop of water swiftly turned into a drizzle, then after a moment, it almost felt as though it were raining.
“I told you it was getting warmer in here,” Rana said as she pulled her fur hood over her head, and the rest of us followed suit.
“My apologies.” Morrigan bowed her head slightly. “You can, however, understand my misgivings given the situation. It made little sense that all of a sudden--”
“Look,” Carmedy said, abruptly interrupting the white-haired woman’s words. The feline pointed down at the ground, and it didn’t take long for the rest of us to see what the cause of her concern was. Quite unexpectedly, the snow around our feet, as well as the rest of the snow that filled the cave, was rapidly melting.
It may have gotten warmer, but this was happening with unnatural speed.
“What in the…?” Annalíse’s voice trailed off. Her eyes widened and beheld the sight of the snow as it turned to slush and then water before our eyes.
&nbs
p; I quickly glanced back up at the ceiling and saw that the icicles that had been there only moments ago had melted away altogether to leave only a black rocky roof.
“What is going on around here?” Rana said as she looked around suspiciously. “I know I said it was getting warmer, but this is insane.”
“This is most certainly the work of the dungeon’s deity,” I replied with a serious tone.
“That makes sense,” Annalíse nodded, “but what was the point of melting the snow?”
“I’m not sure,” I replied. “I’m sure we’ll find out soon enough though. Come on, let’s get going.” I gestured for the others to follow me as I trudged through the collected water toward the tunnel with the white light.
Just like the previous tunnel, this one was wide enough for us to all walk side by side. We pushed on, and the light became brighter and brighter the further we went. The water reached past our ankles and made it an annoying trudge. Not only was it slowing us down, the water was seeping uncomfortably into our boots.
It was almost a relief when, just as mysteriously as the ice and snow had melted, the water seemed to drain away through the very rock beneath our feet. That’s when I saw wisps of steam rising off the water’s surface.
“Look at the water level,” I voiced my thoughts to my companions.
“How very strange,” Morrigan mumbled as the water sank lower and lower before our very eyes. “Perhaps there is a hole into which the water is being drained?”
“I don’t think so.” I shook my head as we pressed onward. “Look closer at the water. Do you see the little wisps of steam that are rising from it in some areas?” I gestured to the water ahead of us and indicated the white wisps that curled away from its surface.
“The water isn’t being drained,” Annalíse said slowly and realization flooded to her face. “It’s evaporating.”
“Exactly,” I said to the female warrior. “The water is turning to steam which means that the temperature is increasing drastically.”
“So what happens when everything melts?” Annalíse asked.
“We should try to find the dungeon deity before that happens,” I said.
