The Dungeons of Arcadia

by Dan Allen

“And no trees—no fae magic,” Nyan-Nyan guessed.

  “There are a few hidden places known only to the ancients,” the Druid said. He lifted his wrist. “That’s why I bring my magic with me.”

  “How does anything survive out here?” Nyan-Nyan said, scratching behind her ear.

  “Either we find out, or we die.” The Druid set off at a brisk pace with his longer human legs. “Quickly, we must find shelter. Arcadia is not a place to be out after dark.”

  Gork followed after the wolf-skin-wearing Druid, not protesting at the chance to increase his distance from the riled up Rocktops before setting up camp.

  Along the wash desert, yucca sprouted spiny stems like overgrown paint brushes shoved into the ground. Gork turned his eyes to the trail just in time to avoid stepping on sprawling cacti hidden in the late afternoon shade.

  Nyan-Nyan followed the other two. She squinted at the bleak landscape. “So this is Arcadia. Lovely.”

  “Where are we going?” Gork asked the Druid.

  It seemed to Nyan-Nyan that he wasn’t used to following others around.

  “I wish I knew,” said the Druid. “If I hadn’t had to give up my eagle form to heal the wolf, I could have scouted ahead for miles.”

  “You can transform into an eagle and a wolf?” Gork said. He cocked a wary eyebrow. “I’ve never heard of a Druid with more than one transformation at your age.” The Druid looked to be less than half the age of the dwarf.

  “That’s because you never met me,” said the Druid. His eyes brimmed with rash confidence.

  “What brings you so far from the Deeproot tree?” Gork asked, raising his other eyebrow.

  “Did you bring any good food?” Nyan-Nyan asked.

  The Druid ignored her question and answered Gork’s. “I came on King Jasper’s request. I seek the Princess Ruby among the ruins of Arcadia.”

  Gork’s already raised eyebrows shot up a bit more in surprise. He exchanged a pleased expression with Nyan-Nyan.

  The young Druid was headed in their direction. That was certainly a welcome surprise. Although, the fact that he was chasing after one of King Jasper III’s rambunctious daughters was perhaps less surprising.

  “I was lucky I found you,” Gork said.

  Nyan-Nyan coughed. “Your luck?”

  “I’m Terras,” said the Druid, offering his hand to Gork. “Thanks for your help with the Rocktops.”

  Gork reached up to shake the taller human’s slender hand. “Gork, son of . . . well, it doesn’t matter. And thanks for your help getting us out of that cursed Crush Canyon. We’re headed to Arcadia ourselves. I’m looking for metal imbued with the ancient magic of the Arcadians. We need its power to combat the cursed weapons of the Dark Consul’s forces.” He thumped Nyan-Nyan on the shoulder. “She’s looking for the Desert Drop Oasis to seek help from the tonnerians.”

  Nyan-Nyan removed a gauntlet to accept the human gesture of greeting but couldn’t figure out how to grip his hand without extending the claws from her fingertips, so she finally just gave him a friendly wave and smiled a wide grin of sharp canines. “I’m Nyan-Nyan.”

  The Druid’s mouth opened, and he raised both hands in a gesture of panic. He looked at Gork in shock. “The Chaos Kitty? You brought the Chaos Kitty!”

  Nyan-Nyan would have offered an explanation, except the ground under her feet gave way at that moment and she was swallowed by the earth in a rush of sand that choked her nose and crushed her on all sides.

  All went black.

  Chapter 8: Lost and Found

  “Nyan-Nyan!” Gork thrust his hand out, reaching for her, but Nyan-Nyan disappeared in the sudden collapse of sand under her feet. The Druid, too, was sucked under before he could summon a vine to anchor himself.

  A sand trap.

  Gork tried to move back, but the ground under his feet gave way just as quickly.

  The world went dark as Gork sank into a coffin of oppressive sand.

  Minutes later, Gork decided that death by being buried alive was quite boring. As a dwarf, he had no trouble holding his breath for as long as fifteen minutes. He might even last a bit longer. All in all, it was a pretty lousy way to go: no glory, no fight—just encased in sand too heavy to breathe in.

  A tickling sensation started on his right leg. It was the first thing to make dying slightly more interesting.

  Stop it.

  Gork was horribly ticklish.

  The sensation drifted higher, heading for his nether regions as it curled around his thigh. Gork struggled not to let out the giggle building inside him and lose the precious air in his lungs. His body quivered with suppressed gasps.

  A second tickling sensation began on his left leg, sliding around his ankle. Then whatever was touching his legs cinched like a noose.

  In seconds, his feet were throbbing from lack of blood.

  I take it back. Can’t I just have regular death by suffocation?

  Gork wriggled, trying to free himself from the snare that had him. As he worked his legs forward and back, the motion became easier and easier, as if the sand were retreating underneath him.

  Gork slid downward in slow increments as the brutally tight snares on his legs torqued and pulled, taking his pants down in embarrassing increments.

  It was bad enough to be suffocated and have some unholy creeper clamping on your legs like a toddler who wanted a lollipop—but to be de-pantsed while you died . . .

  Just the worst.

  At this point, he was out of air, and his lungs were bursting to take a breath.

  Gork began to thrash more wildly. The wiggle room around his legs grew slightly, and then, with a rush, he slid downward. He fell in the darkness in a curtain of collapsing sand, landing on a flat surface with an impact that stung his feet.

  As sand continued to rain down on him, Gork tried to stand, only to have his feet yanked out from under him by the creepers on his legs. He was dragged several feet in the darkness before something that smelled suspiciously like cat pounced on him. “That’s him!”

  Gork pushed Nyan-Nyan away. “Something is on me. Gotta get it off.” He raised one of his axes from its holster but hesitated to strike at whatever was clamped on his legs for fear of maiming himself with his dangerously sharp ax.

  Sparks flew nearby as Nyan-Nyan’s gauntleted claws scratched a brick wall. In the brief glimpse, Gork spied the two vines wrapped around his legs extending out across a sandy floor and up to the wrists of the Druid.

  Stranglethorn. Gork had a mind to knock the Druid’s lights out for giving him the worst near-death experience of his life, being tickled and de-pantsed at the same time while suffocating, but he owed the Druid at least a thanks for saving his life.

  He pulled up his pants and then reached back to the side pocket of his backpack, grateful that it had survived that fall.

  He took the flint and miner’s oil lamp from the pocket and struck the flint with the edge of his ax, showering the lamp wick with sparks. With a second strike of the flint, the wick lit.

  Soft yellow light from the oil lamp filled a dusty cavern. Three piles of sand marked the places where Terras, Nyan-Nyan, and Gork had fallen into the underground chamber.

  “I suppose you got stuck in there because you’re so fat.” Nyan-Nyan pointed at his belly.

  “It was the pack!” Gork bellowed. “I’m as fit as you are!”

  Nyan-Nyan snickered.

  Gork levied his ax and chopped away the vines on his legs. “What is this grungy place?” He hadn’t had the greatest entrance, but at least he was now safe underground.

  “The Arcadians attempted to make aqueducts to bring water from the Frostbyte Reach,” Terras said. “But the tunnels suffered from the same curse, always springing leaks and collapsing. They fell into disuse—or in this case, misuse. I think the sand traps were set up to catch travelers. It’s a nice location right at the outlet of a narrow canyon.”

  “Then where are the robbers?”
Gork held his lantern higher, showing only dusty air and the retreating walls of the long aqueduct.

  Nyan-Nyan pointed to a nearby skeleton. It was stripped clean of everything but its eerie smile. “Corpses don’t run away. The robbers probably don’t come very often to collect their money.”

  “Well, that’s one—ah—ah—” Gork gave a great sneeze, clearing his lungs of dust—another dwarf specialty. The sneeze blast left a large splattering of sandy snot on the wall. “One less thing to worry about.”

  Nyan-Nyan shrank back in disgust. “Watch where you shoot that thing.”

  “No worse than a hair ball.” Gork nodded to Terras. “Thanks for getting me unstuck, Druid. That was good . . . er, magicking.”

  “It’s a nice trick to know,” Terras said. He glanced at a piece of the vine stuck to his wrist as if checking a pocket watch.

  “What’s that?” Nyan-Nyan reached toward the vine.

  Terras pulled his arm clear of her inquisitive reach. “It’s a cultured cutting of the Deeproot itself. The color shows how much magic I’ve got left—about eleven standard spells. Full elves don’t need it. They can sense the magic . . . better, I suppose. But it doesn’t make them any better at using it.”

  So he wasn’t full elf. Surprising. On second glance, he was definitely broader in the shoulders. But what really gave it away was that ‘you probably shouldn’t trust me look’ humans always had. “You’re half human.”

  “What of it?” Terras said.

  “Nothing at all.” Gork knew what it felt like to be different from his peers, to have a constant need to prove yourself. “It’s what is inside that matters,” Gork said. “Unless you’re part giant, because that would really be a problem for—”

  “What happens when you run out of magic?” Nyan-Nyan turned her head toward Terras, and her eyes were suddenly catlike, with vertical slits. Gork had heard of the transformation but had never seen it. Something about it was distinctly unnatural.

  “When I run out,” Terras said. He wiped his forehead. “I can either use my last potion, or . . . I can commune with the Deeproot.”

  “You don’t sound too excited about either,” Gork said. He climbed to his feet and began shaking sand out of his beard.

  Terras chewed his lip.

  “But you’re a Druid. What’s wrong with asking for more magic from the Deeproot?” Nyan-Nyan said as her eyes scanned the darkness beyond the small circle of light cast by the lantern.

  “It’s complicated,” Terras said. “There are some conditions for transference of Deeproot magic.”

  “That vine on your wrist smells a bit like a kobold den,” Nyan-Nyan noted. “That wouldn’t have anything to do with it, would it?”

  “Might,” Terras mumbled. “Look, why don’t you interrogate Gork about what he’s up to?”

  “I already know. He wants Arcadian metal from before the first portal to the Dark Realm was opened. I don’t remember why. There was a lot of food competing for my—” Nyan-Nyan, similarly distracted, didn’t finish her sentence. Staring straight ahead into the darkness, her slit-like eyes glistened with interest.

  “It’s simple,” Gork explained. “The orcs we face use weapons imbued with power by the Dark Consul. It’s ancient Arcadian magic. If we can find enough artifacts we can replicate the runes in our armor and—Nyan-Nyan, what are you staring at?”

  The freyjan’s lips widened into a sly smile. “Booty.”

  “Oh, no you don’t!” Gork and Terras shouted in unison. But it was too late. Nyan-Nyan bounded forward, disappearing down the brick-lined tunnel.

  Gork kicked himself free of the vines and chased after the Chaos Kitty.

  “We’re doomed,” Terras said, racing alongside him.

  Gork screeched to a halt at a tee in the tunnel where the corridor met a much larger dry aqueduct. He could either go left or right. “Which way?”

  Terras knelt and inspected the ground.

  “Boo!”

  Terras screamed, and Gork nearly wet himself as he spun around to see Nyan-Nyan drop from the ceiling of the larger corridor.

  “That’s called ‘boo booty’—get it!?”

  “I’m gonna kill her,” Gork mumbled.

  Nyan-Nyan rolled on the ground, hooting with laughter.

  “This is hardly a time for antics,” Terras said. “We have a serious mission—to find the princess Ruby.”

  “Ah,” Gork said, raising a finger. “That’s your mission. My mission is—”

  “Come now,” Terras said. “Whatever your prior intentions, there can be no denying our encounter was the will of the Goddess. No mission is more critical than finding the princesses of prophecy. For even if you succeed in your missions and I fail, it would make no difference. The Grim Heralds will advance from the Midnight Tower, and the rift to the netherworld will spread like a plague until all of Crystalia is turned to darkness and the light of the Goddess herself is snuffed out.”

  “Well, if you put it that way.” Nyan-Nyan stood up and dusted her fur.

  “So, we are agreed?” Terras said hopefully.

  “No,” Gork and Nyan-Nyan said in unison.

  Gork turned right and headed in what he assumed was the downstream direction, toward the ruined cities of Arcadia. “But you can come with us if you like.”

  “Especially if you don’t eat very much,” Nyan-Nyan added.

  “Oh, you’re joking.” Terras fell in behind the two Frostbyte warriors. “Because that would just be silly if you still intended to follow your own—”

  Gork threw a look over his shoulder, the kind he usually reserved for Brimmy.

  “So, you’ll think on it,” Terras came alongside Gork, the taller, thinner half-elf taking fewer steps to cover the same distance. “But trust me. Once you meet the Princess Ruby, you will be glad you helped me find her.”

  “I doubt it,” Gork said. “Besides, they’ve already lost the fifth princess. What difference will it make if you find the fourth?”

  Terras gave a deep sigh, as if Gork had touched a sore spot. “I would rather cling to some hope than abandon all. Wouldn’t you?”

  Gork cracked his knuckles rather than respond to the baited question. “Shelter, check. What about food?”

  “Leave that to me,” Nyan-Nyan said. She sniffed the air and gave a wry smile, then darted forward with blinding freyjan speed.

  Minutes later, Nyan-Nyan returned with three very large rats hanging by their tails from her gauntleted grip. “Now that’s a feast.”

  “I’m going to be ill,” Terras said, putting a hand to his mouth.

  “What’s wrong with rat?”

  “I’m a vegetarian.”

  “Not when you’re a wolf.” Nyan-Nyan hurled one of the rats at his feet. “Eat up.”

  “I’m not going to waste a transformation just to choke down a rat.”

  In the end, he did.

  Gork roasted his over a few coal stones that he had brought in his pack. The poor meal was made better by the interesting company. At least he wasn’t having to chew his food with Brimmy Brassbuckle making eyes at him. There was a certain peace to being with people who didn’t care about who you were, only that you shared your meal with them—as an equal, a friend.

  Nyan-Nyan had started to roast her rat but gave up and just devoured it. “Probably should have waited for it to finish cooking,” she said with a grimace.

  Gork shook his oil lamp to feel how much fuel was left inside. “We’re going to run out of oil in a few hours. Time to find our way out of here.”

  “Wouldn’t that be great?” Terras murmured, “Running out of light in a dungeon in Arcadia. Can’t think of a much worse ending than that.”

  Gork looked at him with narrowed eyes. “You had to say it.”

  “Now that is booty.” Nyan-Nyan darted across the aqueduct and leapt up a ladder of scarcely visible steps in the brick-lined passage and disappeared through a small round hole high on th
e wall.

  Terras folded his arms. “I’m not falling for that again.”

  The scrape of wood and clink of metal that sounded from the hole were enough to convince Gork she wasn’t pranking him. He clambered up the steep steps and peered into the hole, finding a small cavern hideout within.

  “Don’t take the lamp with you!” Terras complained as he climbed up behind Gork.

  “Scaredy cat,” Nyan-Nyan called.

  Gork looked around the dusty hideout. Nyan-Nyan crouched, low, staring at a chest in the corner of the room as if waiting for it to make a move. Beyond that, there were only a few scattered animal bones, tattered remnants of leather, a few rusted buckles, and several broken arrows missing their tips. “Looks like this room was used by robbers.”

  Nyan-Nyan grinned savagely. “And they left a box of real booty!”

  “Before you—” Terras stuck his head into the low-ceilinged dugout room with a word of warning, but it was too late. Nyan-Nyan darted for the chest and lifted its latch.

  Chapter 9: The Artifact

  The lid of the chest creaked open.

  The problem was Nyan-Nyan hadn’t lifted it.

  A scent of vile decay hit Gork only a moment before the chest sprang forward, the wood of the lid cutting itself into a jagged line of teeth as the possessed chest attempted to swallow Nyan-Nyan whole.

  The freyjan warrior, with her exceptional reflexes, managed to catch the top and bottom of the lid with her gauntleted hands.

  A rough red tongue lashed out of the chest, sliming Nyan-Nyan’s face as it flicked frantically, trying to pull her into its greedy, gaping maw.

  Biter Booty.

  Gork had encountered this sort of thing before. The darkness creeping through Crystalia corrupted everything, even ordinary objects, mixing the living and the dead—human, artifact, and animal.

  The chest made a strangled cross between a gurgle and roar with undertones of jingling metal and grinding gears.

  “Help!” Nyan-Nyan cried as the Biter Booty lashed at her face with its fervorous flicking tongue and blew its death-stink breath at her super-sensitive nose.

  Gork was quite enjoying the predicament. He was getting up to the point of engaging when Terras slapped him across the back of the head.