by Jamie Murray
Awkwardly, Jameson instructed them all to go to the stables without him and he would catch up, and then he returned to where Erestina was waiting.
"I'm sorry," Erestina said, folding her hands. "I just wanted to wish you luck before you left. I'm fearful you won't come back."
"Princess," Jameson started, ready to quell her fears with some encouraging words, but then he noticed she was visibly upset, her eyes turning red and becoming teary. Hesitantly, he put his hand on her shoulder, hoping that would be enough for her. She flinched at his touch, but then vigorously nodded her head.
"Please be safe," she said, taking a step backwards towards the Angel's complex and delicately dabbing her eyes. "I don't know what I would do without you."
At a loss, Jameson only said goodbye to her and then turned around, walking as quickly as he could to the stables. He tried not to run, but he really just wanted to put some space in between Erestina and himself. Perhaps Louisa and Luke's assessment of the princess's feelings towards him had been more accurate than he had originally dismissed them as. When he reached the stables, Cyrus looked as though he was trying not to even notice Jameson had gone back at all.
William mounted a full sized horse with a modified saddle, which made him look even smaller by comparison, but he appeared fully able to command it. "At full speed, the ride is short," he said. "We should be there within the hour."
"What kind of Forces can we expect to encounter?" Johanna asked politely, looking at Jameson out of the corner of her eye.
"I've never been inside," William said frankly without looking at her, and then pulled the reins of the horse to make it start running.
The others followed, so Jameson quickly mounted and began the trip. He caught up with them within a few minutes and, as soon as he did, William's horse suddenly began to go even faster. The other horses had to work in order to keep up with him and Jameson guessed that perhaps the young boy was using magic in order to increase his horse's speed. Luke's aged horse was having an especially difficult time, but the trip was not going to be far so it was all right to push them for just a bit longer.
Up ahead, Jameson could see a large plateau of land which looked extremely out of place in comparison to the normal utter flatness of the wastelands. It was obvious William was riding right towards the rocks so Jameson was fairly certain the maze was likely located there.
William dismounted when he reached the rocks and left the reins untied.
"What exactly is this thing we're looking for?" Luke questioned. "What does it look like?"
"I don't know what it is," William confessed as he looked very thoughtful and pat the nose of his horse. "I imagine we'll know it when we see it."
"Jo, maybe you should stay out here and watch the horses," Cyrus suggested.
"I hope you're not being serious," Johanna said with an over animated frown.
"I suppose not, then," Cyrus said uneasily.
"The maze is a series of naturally formed caverns," William said, raising his voice slightly. "What little I know about this rarity suggests a thieving snake stole it from the Shadow Spirit almost five hundred years ago, and then it hid inside here and never found its way out."
"A thieving snake?" Johanna repeated. "Like an animal? An actual snake?"
"Is there a such thing as a not-actual snake?" William questioned.
"Oh, that's really cute," Johanna said sarcastically, putting her hands on her hips. "I meant as opposed to the Forces, or something like that."
"It's just a legend," William said with a raised eyebrow. "Come on."
Johanna muttered something about William being rude and as the young boy turned away from the group and began searching around on the ground for the entrance. Before Johanna could start ranting to Jameson, he decided to help William look for any indication of where they would be able to get inside the maze.
"Here," Cyrus called, waving his arm for the others to come to where he was standing. He revealed a thin crevice in the ground which opened up into darkness, but there was no way to tell just how far the drop would be until they hit ground again.
"I'll go first," William said immediately as he put his hands on either side of the crevice and simply slipped himself right through without waiting for any confirmation from the others.
Luke looked at Jameson, almost to corroborate what had just happened with him. Jameson shrugged and nodded and, within a few seconds, there was a light coming from inside the cave. William was holding his hands up, each of them emitting a light glow so the space around him was illuminated. The drop actually was only about ten feet and, now that there was light, it didn't seem nearly as intimidating.
"Are any of you coming down or do I have to wait all day?" he inquired.
"He's got a mouth on him," Johanna said, offended.
"Let's go," Cyrus said, ignoring her. He jumped through the hole next and Johanna followed.
When Luke was about to jump, Jameson put his hand out to stop him. "Hey," he said. "You sure you want to go?"
"What's that supposed to mean?" Luke said.
"Well, you came with us so Baloric could answer some questions for you," Jameson reminded him. "I think you're going above and beyond the call of duty, and I just want you to know that I don't expect you to do this."
"Why not?" Luke said good-naturedly as he put Jameson on the shoulder and then jumped into the hole as well. Jameson satisfyingly nodded his head and then jumped down to join the rest of them.
"Everyone stay together," William instructed. "And be careful of the edge over there. If you fall, you'll probably die."
The pathway was about five feet across. One side was a wall which looked like solid rock, but the other side had a steep ledge which dipped into a dark hole which was probably much deeper than the one they had just jumped down. Jameson inched over to the edge to peek at what might be fate if they slipped, but he could not see the bottom.
"What is this?" Cyrus questioned William as he pointed at the thin layer of deep gray smoke swirling around in the pit which leaked up to where they were standing, covering the floor to about their knees.
"Poison," William said casually. "Smoke. I don't know. But don't breathe it. Most people who breathe it in end up dying."
"Is it safe to be standing in it like this then?" Johanna demanded.
"It'll stay on the ground," William answered. "Just don't go crawling around on your stomach and you won't breathe it in."
"Maybe I want to stay behind after all," Luke said, rolling his eyes at Jameson, but then quickly adding, "Kidding."
"Don't take a step without looking first," William gave his last warning and then started walking.
Cyrus inspected the walls and decided to draw his sword. He appeared to instinctively walk closer to Johanna, almost touching her, as if he couldn't function without someone petite to protect. Jameson opted to keep this observation to himself because it would undoubtedly irritate Johanna and make Cyrus feel self conscious, so he figured he could just share it with Luke later on.
Their journey further into the supposed maze went without conversation or issues for some time. Whenever they passed a break in the path, William touched his palm against the wall and created a handprint which glowed briefly and then turned bright white so, when Jameson checked back at it minutes later, it was still visible. William did not offer them any explanation, but they all assumed it had something to do with marking which direction they had come from.
All in all, their trip was fairly uneventful until William suddenly cleared his throat. He did not ever look back to make sure they were all still following him, unconcerned with whether or not they were still there or if they had fallen into the chasm, yet he spoke, "That man—the one you're all doing this for…he is really so worth it?"
"You couldn't understand," Johanna said immediately. "It's impossible for you. You don't even know who he is."
"I asked, but you wouldn't tell me," William said, finally glancing over his shoulder to shoot her a glare
.
"He's a good friend to us," Jameson said. "And to other people too."
"He's a hero," Johanna interjected. "You may not know of that type of person when you live here."
"Correct me if I'm wrong," William said. "That man is also a Gislan, isn't he?"
"I meant because you are a servant to that slave driver," Johanna said angrily. Cyrus visibly tried to void eye contact with both of them, clearly not wanting to even be near this conversation any longer.
"Joy Angel took me and my sister in when I was just a little baby," William said, his voice sounding completely calm. "She saved our lives when our parents were killed by the Forces. She is my hero."
"That's where we differ, I suppose," Johanna said coldly.
"May I just ask an unrelated question?" Luke said, looking to Jameson for approval of his interruption, and Jameson eagerly encouraged it. "How big is this maze? What are the chances we might actually get lost here?"
"And why haven't we encountered any Forces?" Jameson added.
In synchronization with Jameson's question, Johanna yelped and jumped into the air just after she accidentally kicked a squishy creature which twitched and grumbled. The creature was about the size of a small dog, but it looked like an enormous slug with no distinguishable features, obscured by the dense smoke which surrounded it. When Johanna yelled, it began to shift forward, moving very slowly and taking its time to get away from whatever was making noise.
Cyrus speared the creature and it shrieked in pain. He remained lodged in his sword so he lifted it up off the ground to get a better look at it. "Is this a Forces?" he questioned as the giant slug began to slide down the sword towards the handle. He skeptically turned his sword back over so it fell off the other ended and landed on the path with a splat.
"Somehow I expected a little more," Luke admitted.
"Where do you think it was headed?" Jameson said.
"Why would you wonder about that?" Johanna moaned. "Honestly, you get curious about the weirdest, most random things, Jameson."
Jameson sighed and looked around, noticing William was doing the same thing. He spotted another slug-like Forces on the wall, so he went up to it. It, like the one Cyrus had pierced, was steadily moving along. Even though there was currently only one option for a path to walk on, he was getting another one of his feelings.
"What if they're all heading towards something?" Jameson suggested. "Let's find another one."
"Weaker Forces tend to seek out stronger Forces," William said. "So it wouldn't be unreasonable to assume that these are heading towards something stronger."
"So we should go in the opposite direction," Johanna reasoned.
"But what do we know about strong Forces?" Jameson led. "Even though they're strong, they're going to keep seeking out more strength."
"You think that these things might be heading towards where the rarity is located," Cyrus evaluated.
"Why not?" Jameson said.
"It's a possibility," William admitted.
"Let's run with it," Jameson said.
"Oh gross," Johanna said, slapping her forehead. "Why did I want to come along on this anyway?"
"Come on, Johanna, you knew there would be Forces here," Luke reminded her.
"Yeah, but not like these," Johanna said with a groan.
William and his light led the way, taking them deeper into the maze, following the weak Forces which increasingly grew in both number and size with each new turn they made.
36. Its Weak Point is Obvious
Chapter 36
As they ventured deeper into the maze, the amount of Forces increased along with the amount of breaks in the passageways. The Forces also became bolder and faster, occasionally jumping out of the poison gas to perform an action resembling an attack, though they were easily fended off. In addition to all that, the gas was also rising and was drifting up towards Jameson's waist. He was worried about it, but also couldn't help but worry even more about William who was halfway up to his chest in the poison because of his small size. William, however, appeared unconcerned and only continued to press forward and leave his mark on each break in the passages.
The gas was getting dangerously high, and just as Jameson was about to regretfully suggest that perhaps it would be safest to turn back to devise some kind of strategy to avoid breathing it in, he spotted an unusual change in scenery up ahead. He wasn't the only one who noticed it because the same thing was on everyone's minds as they excitedly quickened their pace to arrive at their destination a little sooner.
The structure up ahead looked almost manmade with strategically placed rocks which rose them right up out of the gas and through a massive archway located at the top. There were so many slugs leeching off the stairs that it was difficult to avoid stepping on them as they passed through to the large opening on the other side.
Oddly enough, however, once they were through the archway, the Forces stopped coming. Jameson wasn't sure if that was a good sign or a horribly bad one that they should take as a warning to run away. Yet, when he noticed a brown wooden chest located at the back of the room, he didn't think he would be able to leave without at least checking inside. After all, it didn't seem quite possible that the chest would be able to spontaneously materialize so deep in the cave, and there would be no reason to have a container like that unless there was something valuable inside.
Jameson began to step forward towards it, but William raised his hand to stop him.
"Wait," he instructed.
"What?" Johanna whispered.
"The Snake," William replied simply.
He turned back to and threw his already extended arm at the doorway, and a burst of light propelled out of his palm towards a large shadow which had appeared. The shadow disappeared, but several small Forces which were clinging to the walls dropped to the ground and writhed, looking noticeably smaller and thinner.
At first, it had never occurred to Jameson just how William was using his magic while in the caverns, since there didn't appear to be any plant life around for him to do so. But, as he watched the Forces shrivel up into almost nothing, he quickly realized that the boy had been using the lives of their enemy in order to keep him powered. He dubbed it genius, but there were more pressing matters to attend to rather than William's resourcefulness.
"What was that?" Johanna shouted.
"It'll be back," Cyrus announced. "Arm yourself!"
"I am!" Johanna said as she drew her own sword.
Luke took out his bow and an arrow as Jameson unsheathed his sword as well. William remained indifferent to anything that was going on around him, using only his eyes to look around the room. Jameson had not gotten a good look at whatever had appeared in the doorway, but whatever it was, it had been massive and darkly shrouded. All he wanted to do was run to the chest and kick it open, though he knew it would probably be a poor choice to turn his back on the Forces.
Suddenly, William took a cautious step forward, his arm still extended. Jameson wondered just how many smaller Forces remained for William to draw power from, but the boy seemed confident so Jameson wasn't going to shake him.
"Don't look up, Johanna," Luke said.
Jameson immediately looked at the ceiling, as did everyone else in the room including Johanna. There were hundreds of small slug shaped Forces squirming around the ceiling and the walls. A moment passed which Johanna broke by clearing her throat loudly, but even that moderate silence was broken by the sound of a bellowing roar which echoed through the caverns and shook the maze.
When Jameson lowered his eyes, he was looking right at what had briefly shown itself before. William had been quite accurate when he called it 'The Snake' because, in its basic shape, it resembled a snake, though it was absolutely enormous. Its bulbous head engulfed the entirety of the large archway, and it had one oversized eye which was pointed at the ceiling, so it had to practically fold itself over in order to look at the small group which stood before it. It had small appendages which were about th
e size of a person, but they didn't appear to be used for walking since they protruded from its sides and had sharp tips.
The giant beast opened a gaping mouth which was just as black and empty as the darkness of the chasms. A massive split tongue rolled out in front of them, landing soggy and dripping on the ground, as a faint gray gas rising like heat lines. Jameson deduced that the gas rising from the tongue was likely the same gas which was in the caverns leading them to the room with the chest, and it wasn't far fetched to assume that the Forces before them was the source of that gas.
The creature's breathing was very heavy and sounded almost labored. Jameson barely suppressed the urge to do things in his own style, which involved thrusting his sword into the Force's eye, just as he had done when he fought his first one in the Rain Shrine ten years ago. However, William was remaining absolutely still, staring straight at the creature, so Jameson decided maybe he could follow the lead of others just in case there was a technique to defeat this Forces.
