Sex Rites

by Brandon Fox

  A jolt tugged him as powerful suction grabbed his hand. The gray vortex sharpened into a cleanly defined circle with black streamers ripping across its edges and vanishing into what looked like a tube of silver light. Perception of distances was meaningless in the blackness; the object was far smaller than he had thought. The circle that had seemed large and distant was no larger than a plum and hovered within arm’s reach.

  Suction pulled his hand toward the circle. His palm slapped against it, and a cold ring like metal pressed against his skin.

  A deep rumble filled his ears, and strong currents buffeted his body. Vibrations made him tingle from the soles of his feet to the top of his head.

  He felt a strong jerk, then a bruising fall. Blackness cleared from his eyes, and he found himself lying on the floor with Ander on top of him. Ander scrambled to his feet and moved away, dragging Thane with him.

  “Look!” he shouted, his voice echoing in the high gallery. “It’s opening!”

  Thane got up and joined the others around the rectangle where he and Ander had been standing. The whole section of floor had already sunk a foot beneath the level of the surrounding tiles. It continued to drop at a slow pace, the only sound a distant rumble that was more felt than heard.

  “That wasn’t like any spell I’ve ever felt,” Thane said. He gave Ander’s arm a squeeze. “Thanks. I wouldn’t have found the key without your help.”

  Ander beamed. “You were too distracted. I could feel some of what you felt. It almost made me sick.”

  Thane peered into the deepening shaft, now two feet deep. “Do you know what you did?”

  Ander’s brow furrowed for a few seconds. Then he nodded. “I remembered what you said about the spell feeling like water. And what Dannel said about flowing water being sacred to the hierophants. So I started thinking about water.”

  Thane nodded, impressed and pleased at Ander’s rational approach to the world. His inquisitive mind was equal to his beguiling body.

  “So you were thinking about water. What did you look for in the kei?”

  “Well, I remembered what Katy told me about providing water to the buildings at the lyceum. She showed me one of the valves she built, the new one for the greenhouse. You just start to turn it, and the force of water from the hot springs turns it the rest of the way. So I decided maybe you were sensing real water, and there might be a valve to control it. One you turn with magic.”

  Dannel was nodding his head vigorously. “The hierophants use water for running their machines. Milling grain, drawing water from deep wells, that kind of thing. They use a device they call a hydraulikos to make flowing water turn wheels and pull ropes.”

  “Look,” Thane said, pointing to a spot on the side of the shaft being exposed by the receding floor. “A niche. It looks like there’s something in it.”

  “A metal rod,” Erik said as he leaned over the edge and peered into the dark recess. The section of floor continued to sink. “There’s another,” he said, pointing to a spot that was coming into view a foot to the right and a little lower than the first niche.

  They continued watching as the mosaics on the dropping floor grew tiny and were finally lost in darkness. Thane summoned his telos light from overhead and willed it downward. The shaft’s stone sides were smooth as a fresh coat of snow and straight as a ruler. Whoever carved the shaft had possessed supreme skill in working stone. Soon the shaft was twelve feet deep, and the floor was still retreating.

  Thane reached down and gripped the metal bar in the highest niche. Cold iron an inch thick fit his hand comfortably. He tugged and twisted, but the rod was immovable. “A ladder of sorts,” he guessed. “It seems safe.”

  A zephyr of dry air gusted up the shaft, pungent like hot peppers being cooked. Thane pulled back, his heart pounding. Nosing around secret places built by sorcerers was dangerous business, a lesson he had learned from painful experience.

  Dannel tensed. “I know that smell. I’ve smelled it at the temple, at the door to the hierophants’ library.”

  No harm appeared to come from the sere breeze. Thane leaned over the pit and forced the telos light to sink lower.

  Black space now surrounded the recessed mosaic floor on three sides. It continued to grow as the floor withdrew and then gradually brightened as light from the telos sphere began to reflect from more distant walls. Soon there was a soft thump, and the floor stopped moving. Thane made a quick decision. “I’m going down.”

  “Not without me,” Ander said. “You might need help if the passage closes again.”

  “And you might need a fighter,” Dannel said. “I’ll go too.”

  “All right. Erik and Skorri, you stay up here. Shout if the passage starts closing.” Without waiting for confirmation, Thane slid onto his front and spun around so the lower half of his body dangled in the shaft. His feet quickly located niches, and he started climbing down.

  The shaft continued for twenty feet before penetrating the ceiling at the end of a tall corridor. Niches in the corridor’s wall provided footholds and handholds for another ten feet.

  Thane neared the bottom and glanced down at the floor descended from the gallery above. Jumping the last three feet, he spun in the air and landed in a crouch. The telos light hovered near the ceiling, casting golden light over stone walls that sloped outward from top to bottom. As in the hall above, the walls were covered with glyphs. They glistened in a rainbow of colors, glowing softly as if responding to the anima in the telos light. Thane moved aside as Ander and then Dannel joined him. Nothing else stirred in the passage, but there was a soft sound like a slowly modulating chant in the distance.

  Ander cocked his head and listened intently a few moments. “Not an animal,” he said. “Whatever’s making the sound isn’t taking breaths.”

  “And I don’t feel danger in the kei,” Thane said. “Let’s explore.” He paused to look up the shaft and wave at Skorri and Erik, then turned and started down the passage.

  Thane took the lead, caution overcome by feverish excitement. The corridor sloped down, gently at first, then steeply, though the ceiling remained at its original height and the passage grew no wider. Soon the floor turned to steps. They emerged from a narrow doorway, fifty feet high, into a huge cylindrical chamber. Its curved walls were covered with countless small glass tiles like mirrors. The tiles blazed with the colors of sunrise as the telos light floated into the room.

  The peppery smell they had noticed when the corridor was unsealed grew stronger, the humming louder. Whispers swirled around them like snowflakes gusting through a mountain pass as they started across the chamber. Dannel crouched warily, balanced on the balls of his feet, ready to strike.

  Ander cupped his hands behind his ears and turned his head back and forth, trying to locate the faint voices. As the echoes of their footsteps faded away, astonished recognition filled his face. “It’s Skorri! Not shouting, just talking to Erik.”

  Thane strained. His hearing wasn’t as keen as what Ander had developed as a musician, but he soon heard the whispers transform into faint words. It was definitely Skorri; he was giving his partner an enthusiastic account of how Dannel’s spurting cock had felt as it slid into another man for the first time.

  Dannel rose from his fighting stance, blushing scarlet. Thane thumped him on the back. “Modesty doesn’t last long around us. I would have told you, but it would only have made you more nervous.”

  “I’m not nervous,” Dannel muttered. He didn’t look like he was convincing even himself.

  Thane walked further into the room. As he approached the center of the chamber, the whispers grew louder, until it sounded like he was standing next to Skorri and Erik. The effect was uncanny.

  “Whoever built this was a genius,” Ander said, moving to Thane’s side. He pointed around the chamber, drawing Thane’s attention to inconspicuous slit openings scattered among the mirrored tiles. “There must be channels through the rock, designed to make sounds carry.”

  “That me
ans anybody down here heard us coming,” Dannel said. “We should be careful.”

  “A little further,” Thane said. He continued directly across the circular floor from the point where they had entered. A pitch-black doorway, twice as wide at the bottom as at the top, was the chamber’s only other large opening. The peppery scent strengthened, carried by a gentle breeze flowing from the dark opening. He stepped through the portal, his telos light hovering above his right shoulder. Ander and Dannel crowded behind him.

  Thane’s throat went dry as his eyes adjusted to a new perspective. They stood at the top of a ramp leading from the midpoint on a high wall into a vast crypt. A forest of pillars, bulging at the base and fluted at the top, supported a ceiling fifty feet above the level where he stood. Large marble blocks placed between the bases of the pillars were filled with thousands of niches, and the end of a scroll protruded from each niche.

  Thane realized he had been holding his breath and slowly let it out. The air inside the crypt was thick with spice.

  “What is it?” Ander asked in an awed voice.

  “Secrets,” Thane answered. “Enough for a thousand lifetimes.” He felt giddy and uncertain. Where to begin?

  Chapter Eight

  HUGE pillars receded into darkness like a nightmare forest. Ander shivered, longing for sunlight. He felt trapped and could sense the huge weight of rock above them. The chamber’s vastness made it better than a cave, but not by much. He glanced at Thane, who seemed unusually subdued. Ander shared the sentiment. The ancients who had built this place possessed skills that Izmir and other western kingdoms had never dreamed of.

  He wrestled his dread of caves into submission and stepped onto the ramp. Lady Tayanita had always told him that fear is best confronted quickly, and she was rarely wrong. “Coming?” he asked, sounding far more confident than he felt. “We don’t want to make Erik and Skorri wait too long.”

  Thane shook himself, as if emerging from a trance, and moved to Ander’s side. “I suppose this was built by men,” he said. “But I’m not sure they were men like us.”

  “There are legends,” Dannel said. He spoke softly, apparently not immune to the intimidating architecture. “The hierophants whisper about another race. Powerful and old, from a place beyond any maps. I always thought it was vainglory. Now… I’m not so sure.”

  “True or not, it seems nobody’s here now,” Thane said. He started down the long ramp.

  Ander was about to follow when he noticed a faint pulse of blue light around Dannel. He stopped, eyes narrowed, and looked more closely.

  “What?” Dannel asked, looking at him suspiciously.

  Another pulse of faint light caught Ander’s attention. This time he saw a flash in the firestone, like the blink of a firefly.

  “The firestone,” Ander said, pointing at Dannel’s ear. “It’s flickering.”

  Dannel scowled while Thane turned around and examined the earring. Ander felt a pang of sympathy. The new initiate’s deepest desire was to win freedom from the firestone, but instead it remained the focus of his life.

  “It’s responding to something in here,” Thane said. “Like a talisman.” He touched it lightly, prompting another flash of light. “Do you feel anything when it does that?”

  “No.” Dannel looked uncomfortable, turning his head away from Thane’s touch.

  “Be sure to tell me if you do feel anything,” Thane said. “Don’t worry. We’re making progress.”

  Dannel seemed uncertain. “I hope you’re right. It’s just… I can’t help remembering all the stories. We should keep our guard up.”

  “Good advice. We’ll heed it.” They continued down the ramp, keeping close. Rows of pillars marched off at their sides, fading into the darkness.

  When they reached the floor, Ander looked back the way they had come. The far end of the ramp looked tiny, like the sharp end of a wedge where it touched the wall high above. He felt as if they had entered another world. Not allowing time for fears to overtake him, he walked over to the nearest block and removed a scroll from one of the niches. The material felt strangely smooth as he unrolled a few inches, and the spicy scent that permeated the room’s air tickled his nose. Thane moved to his side, the telos light trailing overhead, and peered over his shoulder at the scroll.

  The text looked like worm tracks to Ander, twisting across each other in a tight tangle of lines and loops surrounded by dots in various patterns. He turned the scroll over, thinking he was perhaps holding it upside down and hoping it would make more sense the other way.

  “You had it right the first time,” Thane said. He took the scroll and righted it, then unrolled another foot of text.

  “You can understand it?” Ander asked, feeling a familiar jolt of surprise at his lover’s abilities.

  “Not really. It looks something like Ionian manuscripts I’ve seen in Lord Tolmin’s library. But it’s only a similarity. I can’t translate it.” He angled the document toward Dannel. “Do you have any better luck with it?”

  Even in the dim light, his embarrassment was plain. “Our training doesn’t include reading.”

  “That’s all right,” Ander said, touching his arm lightly. “You’ll have time to learn, now that you’ve escaped your indenture.”

  He gave Ander a grateful look, then reached for the scroll. “I’ve seen marks like this at the temple in Skarn. They’re carved around doorways, and on ceremonial staffs.” He seemed to flinch as he held the scroll in one hand and touched the writhing text with the other. “They use the staffs in rituals. And to punish disobedience.”

  “It might be a code,” Ander suggested. “Normal writing but with the parts moved around.”

  “Maybe,” Thane agreed. He took the scroll back from Dannel and rolled it up, then started pulling more documents from their niches. “Let’s take these outside. This isn’t a good place to study them.”

  Ander greeted the suggestion with relief. They collected an assortment of scrolls from a dozen nearby repositories. The tightly rolled documents were surprisingly heavy.

  “How are we going to climb the shaft with these?” Ander asked as they started ascending the ramp. “Erik and Skorri will need a rope if we’re going to hoist them up.”

  “You’ll see,” Thane said. “I’m beginning to get ideas about this place.”

  Their retreat from the ancient library was far faster than their cautious exploration had been, but none too fast for Ander. They heard whispered endearments between Skorri and Erik as they crossed the cylindrical chamber; apparently the pair had turned to each other to pass the time. Strange hums and drifting notes like songs on the wind, echoing through narrow airshafts, pursued them down the long corridor. Ander found himself breathing fast as the end of the hall appeared in the golden glow of Thane’s light.

  Skorri and Erik heard them coming and shouted. The three explorers returned the calls, not trying to answer the torrent of questions. When they reached the bottom of the shaft, Thane placed his collection of scrolls on the floor and gestured for the others to add theirs to the pile.

  “What’s that?” Skorri asked, leaning so far over the shaft Ander feared he’d tumble down. “It smells.”

  “Stand back,” Thane called up the shaft. “I’m going to try something.” He pulled Dannel and Ander close, so they all stood on the section of floor that had dropped from the upper gallery. “I was wondering why they’d build a door that opens straight down. Not very practical. But now I think I understand how they used it. Watch.” He closed his eyes but maintained a firm grip on his friends.

  Ander felt a surge of power through their link as Thane reached out with his mind. A nearly inaudible hum rose in pitch, and a soft breeze caressed his cheek. It carried the scent of water. A moment later he felt a deep rumble beneath his feet, and the floor began to lift. Thane’s eyes opened. His pleased expression reminded Ander of the boyish spirit that still filled his lover’s heart.

  “No harder than creating a telos light,” Thane said.
“The power is already there, all you have to do is know where to find it and how to direct it. I wonder what other tricks they built into this place.”

  They huddled closer as the floor lifted them into the shaft that penetrated the ceiling. It was ascending faster than it had dropped, though not by much. The vibration beneath their feet conveyed a sense of great weight, as if a column of solid stone was rising from the earth to bring the ornately tiled floor back to its original position.

  Skorri and Erik watched with wide eyes and open mouths as their comrades rose from below like statues growing from the stone floor. They clamored to try the mechanism themselves, but Thane was intent on getting to work and persuaded them to wait for the next foray.

  By the time they reached the Aerehoth Gate’s entrance, the sun was low in the sky and cicadas were starting their drone in the forest. “There’s a lodging hall on the other side of the lake,” Dannel said, squinting as his eyes adjusted to the sun. “It’s where the guardians stay during pilgrimages. It’s best to be inside after dark. There are lions in the valley, and they hunt at night.”

  “Good,” Thane said. “These scrolls look tough, but I was worrying about keeping them dry. Let’s get started.”

  They retrieved their horses and followed a shaded trail around the lake. Sunlight glinting off the water and the forest’s sweet fragrance soon banished Ander’s thoughts of underground realms. His companions were in high spirits; even Dannel had shed his seriousness for the moment. Their adventure beneath the ground appeared a success, and hope was in the air. Soon they arrived at what Dannel called the Guardian’s Hall, a large building of rough-hewn logs located in a clearing near the lake. The building lacked windows, having only a door at each end. They dismounted and took their horses into a fortified stable on the other side of the clearing before going to inspect their lodging.