by DB King
Marcus glanced up to see the Akhians in full battle-mode. Amun was taking much the same approach to his enemies as Marcus had, while Isa was still dancing a duel of death with the wounded fire demon.
As Marcus watched, Amun used his small buckler shield in his left hand to deliver a staggering back-handed blow to one of the wooden men. He was still holding his flaming torch in that hand, too, so he followed up the punch with a smack to the center of the face that left a trail of burning goo flaming up the wooden man’s face and chest.
The creatures were flammable, it seemed. The wooden man immediately dropped its sword and pawed at its face as flames greedily roared up to consume its head. Amun, apparently not one to pass up a creative opportunity, stabbed his flaming enemy in the throat and dragged his blade back out, coating the blade in a thick flaming substance.
With his short sword ablaze, he attacked the second opponent. This second wooden man dodged Amun’s first blow and dove in to counterattack, but Amun was deadly fast. He knocked the wooden man’s blow to one side with his buckler and stabbed the creature’s belly several times. It fell back and died.
Whie Amun was dealing with his foes, Isa was fighting the fire demon. After its first wound, it had become wary. It danced away from her spear, but its hands had turned into long, curved claws of fire, like the talons of a great eagle. Every time Isa attacked with her spear, the creature dodged and replied with a sweep of these huge, deadly claws.
They circled each other, neither willing to come close enough to land a blow. They seemed to be at a stalemate. Marcus saw that another group of wooden men had detached themselves from the bonfire and were moving toward the fight, but he and Amun had a small window to help their companion.
Marcus glanced past Isa and met Amun’s eyes. At exactly the same time, they had the same idea. They both smiled and pulled a javelin each from their supply. Marcus pulled his arm back and launched his javelin at the fire demon as Amun threw his.
The whistling of the projectiles through the air caught the attention of the demon, and it lifted its head to look at the new threat. In that momentary distraction, Isa leaped forward and stabbed the monster through the heart—right as the two javelins both hit the demon in the head. They stuck fast, flames running up their shafts, as Isa pulled her spear out and quenched the flames in the leaf mulch on the ground.
“Get back!” Marcus shouted, feeling a rush of warning from the dungeon master’s instinct. “Look out for the explosion!”
Isa leaped backward, not a moment too soon. The body of the demon had darkened, reddening as it exploded outward in a flash of searing flame that scorched the ground all around it in an expanding arc.
The flames caught two of the advancing wooden men and they went up like stacks of kindling. The others—Marcus saw now that there were four remaining—dashed forward in a knot to challenge the adventurers.
But the battle-fire had been kindled in the Akhians, and they sprang forward to meet the wooden men’s charge. Isa rammed her spear through the belly of one, while Amun shoved another back and dropped him with a slash to the throat. Marcus stepped up and punched one in the face and stabbed it quickly twice through the chest.
All three turned to the remaining wooden man only to find that Ella had landed on its back, yanked its head back and rammed her needle-like blade through its eye up to the hilt.
The fire in the center of the clearing died down, and the adventurers turned to look.
It flickered, jumped up, and died down again. The green light that filled this dark woodland clearing shone up from something in the center of the space where the fire had been.
“What is it?” Isa asked curiously as she walked toward the fire. Amun came along by her side, and Marcus followed them. He caught Ella’s eye and smiled. All of the Akhians’ fear at the strangeness of the dungeons had been banished by their keenness for battle.
“It’s a doorway!” Amun said in amazement.
Marcus came up beside them. Amun was right: it was a door. Where the bonfire had been, there now stood a wooden plinth just over six feet high, and on one side there was a very ordinary wooden doorway. Green light glowed around its edges.
Amun reached down and tugged at the door handle. Nothing happened.
“There’s no keyhole,” he said, sounding puzzled, “and yet the door seems to be locked. Marcus, what do you make of this?”
“The dungeons often present adventurers with puzzles,” Marcus said. “Look at how we passed the mouth trap in the corridor. We outwitted it rather than beating it with strength. It’ll be similar here. Are there any clues around here that might help us to open this door?”
The adventurer held up their torches and examined the door and the wooden plinth into which it was set. They were all hunched over, their eyes tracing along the plain wood of the door, when Isa exclaimed excitedly.
“Here,” she said. “There is a keyhole—it’s just on the other side of the plinth!”
The wooden plinth that the door was set into was six feet high, by four feet square. The edges were sharp, as if it had been skillfully carved. On the side opposite the door they found a simple round hole, dead in the center of the wooden surface, just as Isa had said.
“Look here,” Ella said from the right side of the plinth. “There’s another one here!”
“And another here,” Amun said, holding up his torch and peering at the left side of the plinth. On every side except the side that had the door, there was a round wooden hole, about as big as a coin.
“It looks big enough to put a finger through,” Amun said doubtfully, “but I’m not sure I’d want to be the one to try.”
“I wouldn’t recommend it,” Marcus said. “No, there must be something else that we need to use, something that’s just the right size and shape…”
The three adventurers looked at each other, and Ella laughed out loud. For a moment, they all glared at her before they all realized what she had already. The answer was obvious. Indeed, it was literally right in front of them.
“The javelins!” Isa cried. “Of course!”
She grabbed one of the javelins from her belt where she’d stowed them, and Marcus and Amun did the same. Ella flew around to look at the door side of the plinth.
“Ready?” Marcus called to her.
“Ready!” she said.
He glanced at Amun and Isa, and they both nodded.
“Now!” Marcus said, and all three plunged the tip of a javelin through the keyhole on their respective side.
There was a tugging sensation on Marcus’s javelin. He felt it pulled from his grip, and he let it go as he saw the others do the same. The wooden javelins were drawn steadily through the keyholes. This was an odd thing to watch. The javelins were five feet long each, but they disappeared into the four-foot square wooden plinth without any problems.
Marcus grinned at the others as he heard the click of a lock opening inside the plinth. Green light shone brightly out from the cracks around the doorway.
Ella grabbed the handle and turned it—and it opened. As the others hurried around to look, she called out happily, “It’s open!”
They all peered inside. A flight of steep stone stairs climbed upward. Daylight from arrow slits in the gray stone walls on either side of the stairway lit the steps and the passageway.
Marcus ducked his head and stepped through. Beyond the low door, the passage was wide and airy and he took a deep breath. The air here felt fresh and clear in comparison to the stale air of the dark forest glade.
“The last passage went downward,” Marcus said, “but this one leads upward, and to clearer air, or so it would seem! Come on!”
He glanced back over his shoulder and saw Amun standing in the doorway shaking his head in bewilderment.
“What’s wrong, my friend?” Marcus asked.
Amun gestured helplessly to the stairs and stepped back into the forest glade. “But… how can this be?” he asked. “Out here, there’s just this block of wood,
but in here stone stairs climb upward?”
“Dungeon magic, Amun,” Marcus said. “The laws of space—and even of time—don’t work in the same way in the dungeons. Come on, there’s nothing to fear but monsters and traps, and that’s what we’re here to defeat.”
Shaking his head in amazement, Amun followed Marcus in. “The people at home will never believe it,” he said with a chuckle. “Dungeon magic. I’ve never seen anything so amazing in my life.”
Chapter 22
The second chamber’s entrance passage was as different from the first as could be imagined. Where the first was dark wood and eerie gloom, this one was bright with daylight and the stone was clean, and nobly carved.
“It reminds me of the monumental architecture in the great castles of Doran,” Ella said as she gazed at the beautiful staircase and the soaring curved ceiling.
Marcus smiled at her. “You’ve seen the cities of Doran over the north sea?”
“I have,” she said, “but that’s a long time ago now and a story for another time. Come on, let’s go on up and see what awaits us at the top.”
About ten feet up the wall, Marcus could see blue sky through the arrow slits that let the light into the stairway. He was fascinated by the idea of the land beyond the confines of the dungeons, because everywhere within the dungeon chambers he was beginning to see a world beyond. Even in his first chamber, the grove, there was a sky with a sun, a moon, and stars. In the Pirate’s Cove, there was the open sea on one side and grassy dunes on the other. He had to accept, he supposed, that the land beyond was an illusion created by the dungeon system, just a backdrop for the dungeons to exist in, and yet it was so real to look upon…
“What are you thinking about?” Ella asked him curiously.
“Oh,” Marcus said, surprised out of his thoughts. “I was thinking… well, I was actually wondering what might be seen beyond those windows.” He pointed up.
“I could give you a boost up to have a look,” Amun suggested with a smile.
Marcus laughed. “Okay,” he agreed. “Why not!”
As if they were two young lads peering over a wall into a neighbor’s orchard, Amun linked his hands together to make a step and Marcus stepped carefully up, as if he was mounting a stirrup.
Amun grunted as he took the strain of Marcus’s weight.
“What do you see?” he asked.
Marcus wobbled in Amun’s grip before steadying himself. He placed the palms of his hands against the walls and put his eye to the crack.
There was a land beyond.
Part of him had expected only to see blue sky beyond the arrow slit, but what he saw made him stammer his words in amazement as he described it to his friends.
“There’s… there’s a whole land out there! I can see rolling hills with green woods and lakes gleaming in the valleys. There are little fields with corn ribe for the harvest, and villages with smoke rising from the chimneys, and even… yes! There are people there too, little people moving back and forth on the roads… so far below it seems we were in the sky!”
He stood there looking at this wonderful sight before clambering down. Amun immediately took a turn, and Marcus lifted him, making a stirrup with his hands so that the Akhian could step up and look out of the window.
“You see it?” Marcus asked.
“I do!” Amun said breathlessly. “It looks like a peaceful land beyond the dungeons, though I don’t recognize it.”
Isa took a turn as well. While the humans were taking turns boosting each other up to look out the window, Ella had flown up to another of the arrow slits and was looking out herself, her small hands leaning on the edge of the slit and her face somber and thoughtful.
When they were done looking, they decided to go on. After all, much as they would all have liked to explore the land below, there was no way down, and no way to know for sure whether the land beyond the window was even really real in a literal sense, or just an illusion, a backdrop for the action created by the dungeon. After all, in the Arena dungeon there was a whole crowd of people who watched the spectacle and cheered and stamped their feet in appreciation, but when the fighting stopped they were blown away and vanished in a puff of smoke like a magic trick. Perhaps the land beyond the dungeons was like that?
Isa and Amun went ahead this time, walking slowly up the stairs and looking out for runes. Ella flew by Marcus’s shoulder, looking thoughtful. Marcus wondered if something she’d seen beyond the window had frightened her, because she seemed so silent. Something told him not to press her on it right now, however.
“Hold where you are for now,” Isa said. “What’s that up ahead?”
“It looks like another rune,” Amun replied. “But it seems to mark the end of this passage.”
Marcus came up behind them and looked past them. Sure enough, up ahead there was a bright blue rune painted on a blank slab of wall. The steps ran up to this wall and ended abruptly.
“In the previous version of this dungeon,” Marcus said slowly, “the second trap was a crushing plate that slammed down from the ceiling and would have crushed a person to a pulp against the floor. I suspect that this trap will be a variation on that one, but will be different somehow as well.”
“Well, I can think of a way to trigger it from a distance without risking being crushed,” Isa said brightly. She pulled a javelin from her belt. “Shall I?”
“Good idea,” Marcus said with a smile.
Isa hefted the javelin in one hand and threw it at the rune. It struck the rune right in the middle with a sharp crack. Two things happened simultaneously: the wall split cleanly down the middle and swung backward, opening onto a brightly lit chamber beyond.
Simultaneously, the top four steps before the entrance to this new chamber dropped away as if they were on a hinge. The javelin that Isa had thrown to trigger the rune dropped through the gap and disappeared.
“Woah, look at that!” Marcus said, edging toward the gap. He’d never seen anything from so high up. He could see a deep blue slice of sky, and a constant low moaning of wind from the gap. The cold air stung Marcus’s face and made his cloak whip around him as he stood on the edge and leaned over, looking down.
The ground was so far below him he felt his head spin. He wobbled momentarily, thrown off balance by the incredible depth of the fall below him. A firm hand gripped his shoulder and drew him back. It was Amun.
“Be careful, Marcus,” the Akhian warned in a somber voice. “A drop like that… no man walks away from such a fall.”
“How do we cross?” Ella asked, ever practical. “Even though I can fly, I’m afraid to cross that gap. The wind is so strong, it may pull me down and out into the void. I would survive it, I’m sure, but I don’t like to think where I’d end up, or how I’d get back, if I ever did get back.”
Isa smiled. “I think I have the solution,” she said. Reaching to her belt, she snapped a clip open and drew something gray from a pouch. It was small, small enough that it fitted in the palm of her hand, yet when she shook it, the small package expanded.
“A rope!” Marus said in surprise.
“I always carry a rope,” Isa said. “This is an ancient craft of the Akhians, we make these ropes very thin, but very strong, and in the tombs of our home we often have need of them.”
She let the gray rope flow across her hands. It slipped neatly into a long coil, with a loop at one end. Gazing across the gap, Isa looked into the chamber beyond for something to fix it to.
Because they were below the entrance to the next chamber, they could not see much beyond the immediate entrance, but Isa pointed. “There’s something there—it looks like a stone statue just inside the entrance. I’ll throw this coil over that statue, and it should be enough to carry our weight if we fall.”
She swung the coil over her head and let it fly. A moment later, she tugged, then jerked it tight. “First time,” she said with a smile. “Now we can leap the gap and if we fall, we can be pulled back up.”
�
��All right,” Marcus said. He felt somehow doubtful, yet this seemed the best solution for now.
“I’ll go first,” Isa said.
“Wait,” Marcus held up his hand. “Let me give you a magical boost first.” In the augmentation view, he quickly applied Hero’s Might to Isa and Amun, to give them an extra boost of strength that would propel them in their jump. The Akhians glowed with the sudden infusion of power. Isa, tying the rope around her waist, took a running jump at the gap.
She jumped powerfully and landed clear of the gap on the other side. She tossed the rope back, and Amun went next.
Marcus cast his spell on himself and prepared to jump as the status update flashed across his perception.
Spell: Hero’s Might Level 2
Level increase: 7%
Progress to next level: 62%.
Ella held his hand and together, they charged at the gap and leaped forward.
But they did not make the leap. Halfway across, Marcus hit something, some kind of invisible barrier. He became aware of it at the last moment, like a giant hand batting him back.
In a slow, horrified moment, he saw the rope that was attached to his belt snap, as if it had been cut by a blade. There was no reason for it to break—it was not even under tension, and yet it did. The two coiled ends flew up in the air, and he fell backward, stunned. With a sickening lurch the gap in the stairs was above him.
He was falling.
The breath was ripped from his lungs as he plummeted in a sickening spin. He saw the green land laid out before him like a tapestry, and far in the distance, a glimpse of blue sea. He was so high up that he could see the curve of the horizon, almost melting with the deep, relentless blue of the sky.
Where was Ella? He looked around wildly, trying to catch a breath and stabilize his fall. He could not see her—but out of the corner of his eye, he caught a flash of movement. It was her!
She flew like a bird, diving with incredible speed, trying to catch up with him. She was gaining. Below, a patchwork of farm fields dotted with little clusters of buildings was wheeling slowly as it relentlessly approached. Marcus’s mind was blank, he could think of nothing he could do to save himself.
