"But he has magic," said Sanval, nodding toward Archlis.
"Because he is a wicked wizard!"
"Magelord, my dear," said Kid. "He stole that title from my master Toram, when he took Toram's book and Ankh."
"Magelord, magician, whatever he prefers to call himself, I would wager he's not trying to pay for a working farm, with vinestock that needs replacing, and a mule that deliberately goes lame when it doesn't want to haul the wagon (and nobody will let me turn into shoe leather), and more dogs and cats than you can count-or feed-because somebody is always dragging home some poor stray. I will not even try to account for the many expenses of an ill wyvern that ended up destroying our barn roof." Ivy subsided. There was no use trying to explain her problems to a man who could afford to bring twelve shirts to a siege camp and had probably never in his life had to sit up all night on a roof beam with a wyvern vomiting some type of acidic sludge.
"I would prefer your farm to any wizard's wonders," said Sanval, and he sounded sincere in his statement. "But I still wish that you had more magic, like that magelord's charms."
"Do not forget his Ankh," whispered Kid. "That is a weapon paid for by murder."
"Ankh?"
"That," said Kid, pointing at the metal pole that Archlis leaned against. It was topped by a smooth loop of metal and a crossbar of the same.
"I though it was a crutch," said Ivy.
Kid shook his head sadly. "No, it is the Ankh of Fire that he stole from my master."
"That is a rather large ankh," said Ivy, eyeballing the length of the thing. "I thought ankhs were little things that priests wore on their belts."
"This Ankh was forged for a giant and casts the most terrible and powerful spells. It took Toram years to find the tomb where it was hidden."
"What type of spells?"
"Fire spells."
"What sort of fire spell?" Her father had hated and feared fire as much as any tree in the forest.
"Many and many, my dear," said Kid, his ears drooping down and back, almost flat and hidden among his curls. "Enough to burn us all. He does not bluff when he claims such power."
"That settles it," Ivy said to Sanval. "You have to stifle any objections to an alliance with Archlis. You did notice how quickly he disposed of those hobgoblins and orcs," she continued when Sanval said nothing.
"But he is the sworn enemy of Procampur," protested Sanval.
"We are his enemies," agreed Ivy in soothing tones. What did it take to make one man in shiny armor to see reason? "And there are more of us, but does he look perturbed? That means he thinks he can beat us and, given the size and the number of fireballs that he was tossing off the walls of Tsurlagol over the last tenday, I think he can too."
"He won't dare try a fireball in here," said Gunderal, catching the end of their discussion. "These tunnels are too narrow. He would burn himself."
When the others looked skeptical, Gunderal said with a huff, "Just because I can't do fire spells does not mean that I never studied them."
Zuzzara shook her head, setting her braids swinging and the iron beads on the ends clicking together. "What do you mean?"
"Flames spread, just like water! Simple enough for you, big sister?"
"Temper, temper," replied the half-orc. "You should eat something. You are getting cranky, little sister."
Gunderal started to reply and then obviously thought better of it. She tore off a small bit of bread and chewed dainty but deliberate bites. Zuzzara smiled to see her sister follow her advice.
"What about that sphere spell?" asked Mumchance. "That fire chased those hobgoblins and orcs precisely enough."
"For all those reasons, we are not going to get into a fight that we cannot win and will not gain us anything," Ivy emphasized to Sanval. "Don't play the hero."
"You always say that," said Sanval in a sharper tone than he usually used.
"Because I know what heroics can bring." A drowned mother, a father so torn by grief that he would rather be wood than human. But how could she explain that to a man raised in Procampur, who thought the world was built on straight, narrow, and well-ordered lines. One who believed you could define people by the color of their roof tiles?
"I will attack him alone," decided Sanval, apparently forgetting that she was supposed to be the captain and the one giving the orders. She had known that was going to happen-she had just known it. "Then you will have time to escape," the silver-roof noble concluded with a pleasant smile.
"And do you think that you would survive such an attack?"
"That does not matter." Sanval sounded happier than she had ever heard him, which was very bothersome to her peace of mind.
"What is the Procampur obsession with rushing in against all odds and getting yourself killed?" asked Ivy. She did not mean to sound harsh, but she did not want to fret about Sanval doing something suicidal. She had so many other things to worry about. "That is as idiotic as your city's ban of the Thieves Guild."
"What is wrong with our ban of the Thieves Guild?" said Sanval, distracted by the sudden criticism of the rules of his beloved city, which was exactly what Ivy had wanted.
"The ban on the Thieves Guild is unnatural, in my opinion," Ivy said, warming to her argument on why Procampur's citizens, especially the one sitting next to her, lacked basic good sense. "It is the same as expecting all the citizens in an entire city to come to an agreement to be honorable and deal fairly with others and not steal their goods."
"You would prefer to be robbed as you walked down the streets?"
"Of course not."
"Or to be allowed to rob others."
"Not me personally, at least not friends and family. But governments and rulers are somewhat stingy and should probably be encouraged to share the wealth at times."
"So you are willing to rob others as long as you do not know them."
"And they can afford it. Never steal from the poor, they don't have anything worth taking." She waited for some response. Sanval's features had settled back into the impassive, slightly stern expression that she knew so well. He did not speak. "That was a joke. But, honestly (or dishonestly if you prefer), thieves who are ruled by Thieves Guilds avoid stealing too much too close to home. City officials supplement their pay with some nice bribes, and the world rolls on. Procampur has to be the only city to take the quaint view that all its visitors, as well as its citizens, should be free to wander wherever they want in the city without having their purses cut or their pockets picked."
"And does that make our quaint view wrong, because it is not true in other cities?" A touch of acid stung beneath his words. And if Sanval's straight spine were any stiffer, Mumchance could have used it as a level. Worst of all, Sanval had gone from his impassive face to that straight-down-the-nose stare that he must have learned in the nursery beneath his mansion's silver roof. It was precisely the look of rebuke that his ancestors must have been giving red-roof adventurers like herself for generations.
Ivy could see a large philosophical hole opening before her-one that probably had a snake at the bottom of it. Which was confusing, because she knew that she had a winning argument when she had started out. A quick visual survey of her friends showed them all sitting there, resolutely silent, and waiting to see how she was going to finish the debate. She grimaced at the lack of verbal verification from those that she had expected to agree with her. Mumchance stared back with a very clear "you dig yourself out of this one" look. Zuzzara and Gunderal were leaning forward, Gunderal fluttering her eyelashes in some type of signal that puzzled Ivy. Even Kid, that hypocritical thief, looked disapproving of her argument. Wiggles just wagged her tail, obviously hoping that Ivy would shut up and somebody would feed the cute white dog sitting at their feet.
"Perhaps we could just agree that getting yourself killed is not going to help anyone, even if it is the most honorable thing to do," said Ivy, returning to the point that she had wanted to make.
"I will attempt no action that would endanger any of you,
" promised Sanval, replacing his helmet very slowly and very straight upon his head.
Only Ivy seemed to notice that he made no promises about his personal safety.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Once he was done with his book, Archlis neatly packed it away into a pouch dangling from his belt. Kid watched him from behind Ivy's back.
"So he still has it." Kid's voice was soft, just loud enough for her to hear.
"What?"
"Toram's book."
"And who was Toram?"
"A bad man. An evil man." Ivy had never heard Kid, whose own morality was rather questionable, state his disapproval so flatly. "But a learned one. He spent his life robbing the secrets of others."
"So are there maps in that book?" The tunnels were twisting round and round. As good as Mumchance's sense of direction was underground, Ivy would have loved to have a map that showed clearly where they were in Tsurlagol's ruins and, more importantly, where they could get out of Tsurlagol's ruins. "Could you steal it?'
Kid fingered the knives beneath his collar. "He has charms to protect him against theft," he reluctantly whispered. "He would have to be distracted and even then… I am sorry, my dear, I do not know if I can do it."
Ivy gave one of his horns a friendly pull. "Don't worry. There's bound to be some other way to get out of here. I have a plan or two in my back pocket."
"For just such an emergency," Kid said, looking more cheerful. "Well, I will watch and wait for my chance. For I do not like that man, my dear." And he continued to watch the magelord's back, fingering his knives in a thoughtful way.
Marching two by two through increasingly narrow tunnels, the group followed Archlis. The magelord strode in front, periodically lighting a finger the way another man would light a candle so he could better see some arcane symbol etched in the walls. He never hesitated, although they passed a myriad of tunnels branching away into the darkness. Of course, Archlis had come this way once before. Still Ivy had to admire a man who remembered directions after having dealt with and avoided some of the most devious traps of place.
One bugbear walked in front of them, and another walked behind them. So far there had been no opportunity for escape.
"We've turned east again," Mumchance said with the certainty of an elderly dwarf far underground. Wiggles once again rode in his pocket, sleeping off her late lunch. Everyone had slipped her part of their bread because she had looked so sad and hungry. Now the dog was so full, she could barely waddle.
"Back toward the city? The city wall that we want?" Ivy asked.
"Closer than we were." Mumchance fingered his fake eye. "We could still use our little treasure against them."
"And kill whom? The one in front or the one in back?" hissed Ivy. "You can't get them all." She turned back to her wizard, the one that couldn't light fires but could definitely feel water. "Where's the river?"
"Still running strong behind us," Gunderal whispered. "I can feel it flooding the tunnels."
"There is something else too. Something old and magical behind us," said Kid, one ear swiveling forward and one back.
"Oh, do you feel it too?" A relieved Gunderal bent down and gave him a quick hug. "I could not figure out what I was smelling, and it was giving me such a headache-I thought it might be a reaction to my own spell."
"What are you talking about, sister?" asked Zuzzara. "Are you ill?"
"I'm fine. But whatever the magic is, it is giving me such an itch in my nose. I feel like I'm going to sneeze, but I can't. It's driving me crazy."
Zuzzara pulled a large silk handkerchief out of her waistcoat pocket. "Blow."
Gunderal blew, delicately of course, and sighed. "Oh, that's better. I felt my ears pop."
Ivy chewed her lower lip and thought about a possible magical threat following them. Well, it was not treading on her heels like the bugbear, so she decided to ignore it for now.
"If we are heading back toward Tsurlagol," said Zuzzara, who was always the most optimistic of the Siegebreakers (as long as her sisters Mimeri and Gunderal were happy), "then maybe we can find our wall again. The one that we are supposed to knock down."
"The Thultyrl gave us two days," Ivy said. "And I don't think that we have even finished out half of the first day." She thought about the number of fights, wrong turns, and other disasters that had befallen them. "Well, maybe more than half."
Sanval answered softly, "The Thultyrl may not wait. I did not go back to the camp. They would have investigated and found your tunnel collapsed."
"And presume that we are dead?"
"Or unable to complete your task."
"What will they do then?" Ivy asked.
"Charge the wall without your help."
"Wonderful thought." Now she had to worry about an entire troop of Procampur's finest trying to scale the western wall and overrun Fottergrim's orcs in the holdings at the top. Even without Archlis opposing them with his fire spells, it would not take much to turn the charge into a rout.
"Well, this looks like trouble," said Ivy.
A pair of oaken doors blocked the way. The lock had been burned open, and the blasted doors hung half off their hinges.
"Waste of magic," Mumchance said when he saw the condition of the doors.
"He has magic to waste, dear sir," replied Kid with a significant wink toward Archlis. The magelord stood behind them, flanked by his bugbears, and was obviously waiting for them to survey the room beyond.
Peeking through the ruined doors, they could see a corridor with a checkered floor made from huge stone slabs. Some had a fine cross-hatch pattern cut into them. Others were marked with a spiral of stars, and still others with wavy lines. A few squares were polished smooth and blank.
"Earth, sky, ocean," said Mumchance. "And that which we find on the other side of death."
"Nothing," said Ivy, because this was an old lesson, one that her mother had taught when she had taken Ivy hunting for treasure in the wild. She had seen such patterns in ruins before. They invariably led to a tomb or crypt. "It's a path to the dead."
"A bit more dead than usual, my dears," pointed out Kid.
For the floor was littered with the bodies of hobgoblins and orcs, a ragged and rather squashed looking troop. Their lifeless, muscular bodies were limp, their blank yellow eyes staring at nothing, their hide and rough hair poking out from breaks in their once bright armor. Shields were as flat as plates, and swords smashed.
"More of Fottergrim's?" asked Ivy.
"They pursued us through this section," said Archlis, "but they did not know the secret of the squares. The ceiling crushed them as it does anyone who does not know the pattern."
At this pronouncement, they all glanced up. The ceiling was low and gleamed with a spectral light, clearly showing a lattice of iron suspended above the floor. A long pointed spike was welded to the corner of each tiny square formed by the ironwork. Some of the spikes were clearly blunted by repeated poundings on the stone floor below. Others still dripped with bits and pieces of the unfortunates who had passed below without the knowledge of the floor's pattern. Chains ran from the lattice into square holes cut into the stone ceiling above.
"The floor is constructed in such a way that if four people move across the squares in unison, the trap stays in the ceiling. Should one make a misstep, the trap comes crashing down. I have the pattern here," Archlis withdrew his spellbook from his pouch and unfolded a page twice as large as the book from its center. The parchment was blotched with terrible stains, but a series of gray-brown lines and rust red symbols could be seen on one side.
"You and you," said Archlis, pointing at Sanval and Zuzzara, "should go first, as you appear to be about the same weight. Then"-he nodded toward Ivy and Mumchance- "you will follow. You must step exactly as I say."
"And then what?" asked Ivy.
Archlis pointed with the head of his Ankh to the doors visible at the opposite end of the room. "There is a lever on the left-hand side. Turn it three times to the right. The lock ha
ndle must be turned delicately and correctly, but if done right, the trap will remain locked long enough for the rest of us to cross."
"Then it resets itself?" asked Mumchance.
"Yes. There is no way to lock it open permanently. But it takes some time for it to reset. After we had left this room, Fottergrim's trackers were able to cross it safely when they followed us. We eluded them in the maze that it is beyond those doors, but were forced back. We locked the trap from that side when we crossed the room again so more than half the trackers escaped with their lives and continued to hunt us into the room where you found us."
"So when the ceiling comes down, it comes down fast," said Mumchance with a speculative note in his voice. "And it probably goes up very slowly."
"Whether it is fast or slow does not matter. I hold the pattern here. We used it to cross once before. Once you have reached the other side, the dwarf will turn the lock and secure the room as I have instructed. That should be within his skills," said Archlis. Mumchance snorted. "Then we will follow you," continued Archlis. "Now take one step right, one step forward, and one step left, and repeat that pattern until you reach the other side."
"It sounds like a court dance," said Sanval, readying himself to cross by the usual straightening of his helmet and a quick check of his weapons.
Ivy looked across the room and at the corpses that littered many of the squares. She laid one hand on Sanval's arm to keep him from stepping out. "But there are extra bodies on the floor, and that will make it harder. Hate to trip over someone else's feet as we glide along."
"Or someone's severed head, more likely," said Mumchance, eyeing the carnage.
"Can we do it?" questioned Zuzzara. "If one is off count or stumbles…"
"All of us die," said Ivy, turning to Archlis. "I don't like this."
The magelord adjusted his grip on his Ankh, one rusty ring on his hand grating unpleasantly against its smooth metal surface. "If you refuse, you will die faster. Then the others can choose which danger is greater-the floor ahead or myself. I only need four to cross and turn the key."
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