by Dante King
“Even without the dream, I would have come,” Vesma said. “The guild house is too boring for me. I want some fun.”
“This is your idea of fun?”
She grinned as she held up her knife and a Scorched Salamander core. “Of course.”
“Is this your idea of fun too?” I asked Kegohr. I might have expected it of him, with his bulging muscles and his tusks. To my surprise, he shook his head.
“No, no, no,” he said. “Coming to a Vigorous zone isn’t a lot of fun to me, whatever we get to do here. But I couldn’t let Vesma go without me. I’d never forgive myself if something happened to her.”
“Idiot.” Vesma gave him a playful shove. “I don’t need a keeper.”
“Everyone needs help sometimes,” he said. “Ain’t that right, Effin?”
I smiled back at him. “That’s right. Especially down here.”
“We should gather the rest of the cores,” Vesma said. “I want to absorb a few Daji cores before--”
“No,” I said in warning. “We can’t risk you taking a hit to your Vigor.”
I also wanted to learn a new technique, especially one as powerful as Flame Empowerment, but I knew the dangers of absorbing cores when there was more fighting to be done.
Vesma frowned and crossed her arms. “You boys can’t handle a few fire monsters?”
“I’m not saying we can’t, but you’ll need to pull your weight.” It was obvious Vesma knew that we needed her, but I didn’t want to make it plain. I enjoyed the banter between us, and I was sure she did too.
“I’ll pull more than my weight.” She knelt beside a sprite core and made a small incision in its chest. “Idiot,” she muttered as she removed the bone-cage.
We gathered the cores together and put as many as we could fit into my bag. Once we got back to the surface, we could divide the spoils so that each of us received what would be most useful. But for now, we had to keep moving. We had one night to conquer the Ember Cavern and come back with our prize. Otherwise, we’d face a lot of awkward questions and some punishing lessons from Master Rutmonlir. He might have given us the night off to train, but I doubted he wanted us in a dangerous place like this.
“That way.” Kegohr pointed down into the pit where a narrow path zigzagged back and forth along the wall and headed down into the depths. “Hope your balance is good.”
I headed down the path, with the others close behind. A hot wind blew from below, and ashes drifted up to touch our skin. I could smell the burnt aroma from the lava-like blood of the creatures we’d killed as the thrill of the quest ahead urged me further into the Ember Cavern.
Chapter Fourteen
As we headed deeper into the caverns, the rocks started to change. They became darker, heavier, smoother, as if everything had been melted, scorched black, and reduced to its most intense form. As if the world had been boiled down to a thick rock treacle and then cooled in place.
There were still the same sources of light—amber-colored crystals and seams of red, glowing rock. But they too became more intense, their brightness concentrated, their color magnified. The crystals were no longer in the ceiling only but scattered all around, embedded in the rock walls and floor. Their sharp edges and narrow points made them painful under foot, but we quickly learned to walk around them.
“Get out of my face!” Kegohr bellowed as a swarm of flame-winged sprites flapped around our heads.
He swung with his mace, but the slow, blunt weapon was little use against these fast-flying beasts. The mace fell to the ground with a clang, and he set on his attackers with clawed hands.
I slashed at the sprites with my sword. I’d managed to take down a couple that way, but it was mostly to keep them from setting my hair on fire. Stinging Palm was more useful. The thorns flew fast enough to hit an agile target and were powerful enough to kill a small animal in one go. Even so, the creatures kept clawing at my clothes and scorching my skin with their burning wings.
Fast and agile, Vesma darted between me and Kegohr as she ran winged sprites through or sliced them down with the long blade of her spear. A whirlwind of movement, she seemed to be everywhere at once, just like the sprites. Small bodies fell around her, and the fire of their wings died as they hit the ground.
A winged sprite flew straight at my face, claws extended, and I hit it with a blast from my Stinging Palm. I cut it in half before it could retaliate. As the two halves of the sprite tumbled to the ground, another creature dove toward me. I launched a second series of thorns at the creature, and it spiraled out of control. Before it could return to me, I summoned a Plank Pillar that sent the sprite up toward the ceiling and impaled it on a stalactite crystal.
Kegohr flailed at the creatures around his head and snatched one just as another singed his furry head. Then, Vesma jumped up behind him, used his shoulders for leverage, and vaulted into the air. Her blade swept around in a wide arc, and a perfectly calculated attack caught the final three winged sprites.
At last, we stood amid a scatter of monster corpses.
“Yeah, yeah, yeah.” Kegohr beat out the smoking ends of his hair. “Another victory for Team Fire Cave!”
“That’s the best name you have?” Vesma asked. “Team Fire Cave?”
“You got anything better?”
“I couldn’t have anything worse.”
“You sound like a master,” I said. “If that master didn’t want to admit to not knowing an answer.”
“I need something to drink,” Vesma changed the subject. “I’m parched.”
The heat of the tunnels and the exertion of the seemingly endless fights had left us all dehydrated. Vesma and Kegohr had already consumed the water they’d brought with them. I hadn’t known how long we’d be in the caverns, so I’d taken the more careful tactic of rationing my water. Except I’d used everything down to the last drop after the first encounter with the dajis.
Unsurprisingly, there were no wells or streams down here in a Vigorous zone of fire—not streams of anything other than lava, that is. I wasn’t slowing down yet, but it wouldn’t be much longer before dehydration started taking its toll.
“We’re nearly at the heart of this place,” Kegohr said. “Then, we can all head back up to the guild for a nice cold glass of something. I fancy goats’ milk, all lovely and creamy.”
“Beer,” Vesma said.
“Just water will do me,” I said. “But I’ll take whatever they’ve got.”
We walked on down the passage, weapons still raised. A minute later, it opened out into another cavern.
The light here was brighter than in the rest of the tunnels. At the back, flames leapt from a lake of lava, and their smoke vanished up a gap in the roof above. In front of the lake stood two pedestals of smooth, black rock. A core glowed on one pedestal, the object much like those we had taken from fallen beasts but larger, brighter, and blazing with white heat. On the other sat a weapon that had been haunting my dreams for months. A blade etched with fine lines that glowed with an inner light and, together, comprised the image of a dragon.
Nydarth. The Sundered Heart.
At last, the end of our mission was in sight.
Before I could storm across the room and take my prize, two creatures emerged from a tunnel behind the pedestals. Each was the size of a rhinoceros, with hulking shoulders and long, clawed feet. Their heads might have belonged to gigantic rottweilers, and rows of razor sharp teeth gleamed in lean snouts. Blue flames flickered in their eyes as they glared at us. The orange glow from lava-fissures in the walls bathed long barbs that ran along their spines.
“Hellhounds,” Kegohr murmured. “There just had to be hellhounds.”
“You’ve met these things before?” I asked as the hellhounds’ menacing rumble filled the cavern, so low and loud that it made my teeth vibrate.
“No, no, no.” Kegohr shook his head. “No way I’d have lived through that fight on my own. But I’ve seen them from a distance. They’re real monsters.”
“
What martial technique do their cores give?” I asked. Maybe I should have been focusing more on the threat, but I was eager to learn another technique while I was here.
“Burning Wheel,” Vesma said.
“No chance we could go back, come another day with more people?” Kegohr asked, still focused on the danger of the situation.
“What other people?” Vesma asked. “Who would come for this?”
Muscle rippled beneath black fur as the hellhounds prowled slowly toward us. Each step they took left a burning footprint. Drool ran from between one’s teeth and hissed as it hit the floor.
It didn’t matter to me if there were other people we could bring or not. We’d come this far, and I was determined to complete my quest: to rescue Nydarth and her sword from the depths of the Ember Cavern. If I could earn a few cores in the process, that was a bonus.
Fortunately, I was starting to have the beginnings of a plan.
“Play this one defensively,” I said to my friends. “Like you did with the Dajis. Keep them occupied as much as you can. I’ll do the rest.”
Kegohr and Vesma both closed their eyes for a moment and concentrated on the Vigor within. Then, shields of flame appeared on each of their left arms. They raised their weapons, stepped forward, their movements in perfect sync.
The hellhounds roared, and the sound echoed in mighty reverberations throughout the cavern. I winced at the assault on my eardrums, but the deafening noise wasn’t the end of their attack. An azure-colored fireball no bigger than my fist burst from their maws. Rather than shoot forward like a salamander’s fireball, the spheres of flame spun end over end. They expanded as they rotated, until they were like flaming whirlwinds.
The twin fiery storms cascaded around the cavern, and Vesma and Kegohr lifted their Flame Shields to deflect them. Blue fire met orange flames as the whirlwinds bounced off their shields and traveled in the opposite direction, only to collide with a wall and return toward them.
“Keep bouncing them away!” I yelled at my friends.
The monsters roared again, and another pair of flaming whirlwinds joined the first two. Now, there were four roaming pyres to deal with, and it made Vesma and Kegohr’s job that much harder.
I concentrated on the timing of their travel paths, saw an opening, and sprinted toward the hellhounds. I spun out of the way of one whirlwind and summoned a Plank Pillar in the trajectory of another. Rather than bounce off the pillar like it had done with the Flame Shield, the pyre was only interrupted for a moment before it engulfed the wooden wall in flame.
But a moment was all I needed. I skirted around the third whirlwind and spun to avoid the fourth. Then, I was facing two rhinoceros-sized canines that immediately attacked. They snapped at me from either side, and I jumped onto the head of the one on my left. I plunged my sword into its brain, and it died with a yelp. The other monster roared, and a sphere of flame shot out from deep within its throat. I lifted both palms and shot an Untamed Torch into the middle of the sphere. It split in half and passed me, the heat of the flames burning my ears. The fireball turned into two, smaller whirlwinds, but they were Kegohr and Vesma’s problems now. I had a hellhound to kill.
The monster pounced at me, and I ducked beneath a swipe. The other paw blindsided me and knocked me to the ground. I rolled away from a whirlwind a second before it would have devoured me and jumped to my feet. I whipped my blade around as the hellhound snapped its jaws, but it chomped on the end of my blade and tore it from my grip. With a massive gulp, it swallowed my sword and lunged toward me.
I summoned a Plank Pillar, and it tore through it as though it was made of plywood. I needed a weapon to defeat the monster, and it had just swallowed my only one.
No, there was another weapon here. The Sundered Heart Sword.
I danced around the roaming pyres and blocked them with Plank Pillars as I raced toward the plinth at the back of the chamber. The hellhound’s footsteps boomed from behind me, and a roar signaled the entrance of yet another flaming whirlwind. My hand gripped the Sundered Heart as I whirled around to face the beast.
It paused for a moment and snarled, as though it dared me to strike.
“You came for me,” Nydarth spoke from within the sword.
“I couldn’t exactly leave you in here with this thing,” I said as I swung the blade. I was surprised when no wave of flame erupted from its tip, and I quickly blocked a swipe from the hellhound’s paw.
“My power is weakened. The sword no longer carries martial techniques.”
“I won’t need them,” I managed to say as its jaws clamped down on the blade.
Instead of tearing the weapon from me, my grip held fast, but the monster used it to fling me to either side. I crashed into the ground, but my hands stayed firmly wrapped around the sword’s handle. I put every bit of strength into not releasing my hold. I didn’t know what would happen when it swallowed the Sundered Heart, but I couldn’t risk losing my last hope of killing the monster.
The hellhound attempted to fling me behind it, and I held tight. I felt its teeth weaken around the blade as the sword slipped from its teeth, and I flipped over its back. The weapon still in my hand, I somersaulted behind it and landed on its back. A spike extending from the creatures spine left a gash in my thigh, and pain flared from the wound as the hellhound jumped and jolted like a bucking bull.
I slashed and cut the beast’s back as it tried to remove me, but I continued carving it apart like a Christmas turkey. Soon, my attacks chipped away at fur and penetrated its rough skin. The hellhound grew more fervent in its attempt to throw me from its back, but I managed to hold on. Every movement made my wound larger and more painful, but I forced myself to continue.
When I saw soft flesh beneath its tough hide, I drove my sword down into its body. The monster howled, and its mouth ejected the largest blue sphere of them all. As the hellhound fell in death, the projectile expanded into a whirlwind that covered almost the entire chamber. It absorbed the other pyres as it traveled, and I watched in horror as it moved toward my friends.
Kegohr and Vesma had increased their Flame Shields so that they covered their whole bodies, but I doubted it would be enough. To save them, I would give every last ounce of Vigor in my body. As far as I knew, wood was only weak to fire, not completely ineffective.
My thigh screamed in pain as I climbed over the hellhound’s corpse. All I could manage was a desperate limp as I faced the giant whirlwind and spread my hands toward it. I gathered the Vigor inside me and summoned a Plank Pillar on either side of the massive pyre. It attempted to bounce off one wooden wall, only to collide with another right next to it. I dropped to a single knee and forced myself to continue. As soon as one Plank Pillar engulfed in flames, I summoned another. I continued the grueling process until I felt like a wet towel that had been wrung out, over and over.
I fell to both knees as Vesma and Kegohr joined the fight with their Flame Shields, and the whirlwind grew smaller and smaller until it was little more than an ember. I produced a final pillar, and it held fast against the withering flame that finally winked out of existence.
Blackness invaded my vision, and I started to teeter on my knees. The Sundered Heart Sword lay to my side, and I reached out to grab my prize. I fell onto my face as my fingers wrapped around the weapon’s handle.
“Let me fill you, Ethan,” Nydarth said.
Strength surged along my limbs, and the pain in my thigh grew dull. Vigor flooded my body as my wound repaired. Warmth surrounded me, and then, it was suddenly gone. I was still exhausted, but I managed to stand.
“I thought you didn’t have any power left?” I asked Nydarth.
“You have wielded me against magical creatures,” she answered. “Your efforts have given me strength.”
Vesma and Kegohr rushed to my side.
“That was the greatest battle I’ve ever fought,” he said. “They’ll tell stories about this.”
“Who will?” she asked. “We can’t tell anyone we came
here. The masters will have our hides.”
“I think they’ll already know we snuck out,” I said. “It’s probably morning already.”
Vesma knelt beside a hellhound, prodded around in the guts with her spear, pulled something out, and handed it to me.
“Your kill,” she said as I looked down at the core. It was larger and brighter than the ones I’d seen before. There was a lot of power in a hellhound.
I walked over to where the other hellhound had died. The flames were consuming its flesh so quickly that everything was almost reduced to ash already. Among the embers, I saw something that glowed even brighter. Using my sword, I dragged the core out, let it cool for a minute, then absorbed it along with the other one.
“Three more of them, and you can learn Burning Wheel technique,” Kegohr said.
“Neat,” I said. “But there’s something else I want.”
I’d already taken the Sundered Heart, but now I wanted the core on the other pedestal.
I walked past the hellhound corpses to the plinth and reached for the glowing item.
“Stop!” Nydarth said. There was such concern in her tone that I obeyed without even thinking. My hand hovered inches from the prize but didn’t descend to take it.
“What is it?” I asked.
“That is the Fire Core,” Nydarth said. “The very heart of this mountain.”
“It must contain phenomenal power.”
“Oh, yes, my sweet man, such power as you have never even felt. But it is not power you have earned. When you hunt magical creatures, when their blood runs fresh across your flesh, something is forged in the hunt. Through your hunt, you earn the right to those cores, whether for yourself or for those you bestow them upon.”
“I have cleared the Fire Cavern,” I said. “I think that gives me the right to take the Fire Core.”
“The core is needed here,” Nydarth said, her tone pleading. “It helps the other Augmenters in your guild. It produces the beasts they hunt, sharing a little of its power each time it gives life from itself. This keeps the Radiant Dragon Guild alive.”
