The Crystal College

by Nathaniel Sullivan

  But he is dead now. Dead at the hands of Lord Viken, who in turn, died at Nandor’s hand. It’s almost poetic. Lord Viken was never the best of rulers—he was too foolish to see that Lady Mikja and Lord Grimbone intended to deceive him from the beginning, but he served his purpose, in the end. I would have liked to be the one to end Nandor, it’s true, but I won’t be petty—I am satisfied with his termination.

  And now that Lord Viken is dead as well—I must admit, that leaves a lot for me to do.

  Froj has lost the war, but that isn’t necessarily a bad thing. Most will be fearful. Most will run and flee to the other cities. Many will starve.

  But that is only for the moment. Wherever there is chaos, and great suffering, there is equally great room for opportunity, and I intend to utilize this chaos to my full advantage.

  Although he has no heir blessed with his right to rule, Lord Viken does have some lovely daughters. Perhaps it’s time I paid them a visit. Perhaps it’s time I settled down and became a proper married man—respectable and renowned. And from there, it might be easy to proclaim my right to rule—if they protest, I shall remind them:

  Who was it that warned of Nandor’s meddling?

  Who was it that gave Froj the best fighting chance, by saying that the youth should fight?

  Who has stood by the city during both thick and thin?

  Who has taught its students and worked to make us strong?

  And most importantly, if I can secure it—who is married to Lord Viken’s most lovely daughter?

  When they roar my name, they will demand that I take lead, and become the ruler of Froj, to set things right in these tumultuous times.

  Yes, it may be a terrible time for many, but for me, it is the opportunity of a lifetime. So I can only say this—thank you, Nandor, for coming back into my life.

  Your idiocy may work to my favor, in the end.

  —The Journal of Benjfrost

  The third floor of the tower was as suspicious looking as the first two. It had no exploding tinker-toys or talking rugs or enchanted mirrors—but it had something equally strange sitting in the middle.

  A monkey.

  A snow monkey covered in yellow-white fur, weighing in at about twenty-five pounds, and licking its fingers as it picked at a large pinecone stuffed with sticky nuts.

  “N-Nandor?” Nix asked. All eyes were fixed on the monkey.

  “Ignore it,” he instructed. “Walk around the edges of the room—we just need to make our way to the next stairway. Whatever foolishness this is can wait.”

  “What if it bites?”

  “Kick it,” Dorin suggested, leading the way.

  “You’re sure acting bold all the sudden!”

  The bot nodded, walking slowly yet confidently. “You said you see no mystical auras on this level, so I’m content.” It nodded towards the monkey, “Fleshy creatures have no power over me. Particularly not the most unevolved amongst us. What’s it going to do? Fling shit at us? Ha! Nothing for me to fear.”

  “Just because we don’t see any auras, doesn’t mean that this isn’t a trap,” Nandor warned it. “Be cautious.”

  Nix was disgusted, “Monkeys fling shit?”

  Nandor nodded, “When scared, or angry, or simply playful, yes. Though in reality they will fling anything they can get their clever little hands on.”

  They hugged the edge of the room as they moved towards the next part of the staircase. The monkey looked up every now and then, but mostly it ignored them, instead paying attention to its pinecone treat. It chewed and pried the pinecone open in several spots, and then smacked its lips in delight as it found new nuts to chew on.

  “At least it’s a tame monkey.”

  “Apparently,” Nandor agreed.

  Then, they stopped in their tracks. Dorin became tense.

  “What’s wrong?”

  “There’s a door barring the way to the stairs,” it replied, and shuffled aside for its companions to see.

  Nandor frowned. It was a wooden door—very large, very solid, and attached with huge iron hinges that would take hours to try to pry apart. There was a large doorknob in the middle. He examined it through his enchanted spectacle, and saw nothing strange about it.

  Tenderly, he reached out his hand to turn the nob. It remained solid—it didn’t as much as jiggle. He peered closer and saw a ridged opening for a large key.

  “Is it locked, sir?”

  “Yes,” he muttered, and cursed under his breath.

  “Don’t worry! I can handle almost any old lock!” the bot proclaimed, twisting aside its saw and clanking its probing arm into position.

  Nandor stepped aside to allow Dorin to do its work, and as he did, his gaze fell upwards. Surrounding the door, hanging just above the upper edges were metal pipes pointed directly downwards. Quickly, he pushed Dorin aside. “Stop!” he barked.

  “Goodness! Whatever is the problem?”

  “Those pipes—” he pointed, “—they could be a trap.”

  The bot looked up. “Oh, I see. So one wrong twist of the old probing arm and there could be a rain of fire on my head?”

  “Possibly,” Nandor said, “Or anything could be pumped through those pipes.” He stood on his tippy toes to get a better view, “They look different from the pipe surrounding the tinker-toys… so I don’t think they are attached to a conductor, or not the same one, at least.”

  “Indeed,” Dorin agreed, uncoiling its legs so it could stand higher, “They must be set on a trigger of some sort. I think you are right—probably they will trigger a reaction if the lock is turned the wrong way.”

  “Any idea what kind of reaction?” Nix wondered.

  “Inconclusive,” Dorin replied. “Could be more fire, or worse.”

  “If its fire, would you be able to use your elemental abilities again?”

  “Possibly,” Nandor shrugged, “depending on what and how powerful it is. But I don’t like to do that kind of thing if I don’t have to. There’s always a degree of risk involved. If I don’t focus just right, I could channel too much inside myself. If I don’t redirect the energy properly, I could burn, or even explode.”

  “Well I certainly don’t fancy putting my hand in the lock and risking the repercussions either!” Dorin said. “Fire and oil doesn’t mix!”

  “I don’t even know how to pick a lock if I wanted to!”

  “Guys, guys,” Nandor waved them to a calm, “relax. No one is asking anyone to try to pick the lock. We haven’t exhausted our full range of options yet. Dorin—do you think your saw can cut a hole through the door?”

  The bot sighed out steam, “Depends on if there is metal on the other side. I could cut through this wood,” it tapped the door, “but it would dull my blades considerably. And if the trap trigger runs through the door into the lock, then I also risk setting it off, if I pick the wrong place to cut a hole.”

  “Surely we can bypass the trap somehow?” Nandor growled, looking all along the edges of the door.

  “Sagger and Lareja can’t stay locked at the top of the tower forever, perhaps we could simply wait them out?”

  “We don’t have that kind of time,” Nandor rumbled. “What we’re doing isn’t strictly allowed. While I don’t think that the grandmaster will try to stop us, if some students show up and see us trying to take down the tower to kill Sagger, he might be forced to intervene. Either Sagger would be banished, or we would be depending on his spine. No—its best we do this here and now, as fast as possible. Sagger and his cronies must die tonight.”

  The three companions examined the door barring their path for several seconds, cursing and muttering as they tried to think of ways to get around it without triggering the trap.

  They were so focused on the door that they hadn’t even considered the monkey until it let out a solitary, almost mocking screech, “Eeeekheek!”

  Nandor turned—the monkey was still sitting in the middle of the room, but it had tossed aside its pinecone, and was eyeing them with int
erest, raising its shoulders up and down. Dorin noticed it as well. “Sir, is the monkey taunting us?”

  “I don’t think it’s necessarily taunting us…” Nandor started to mumble, but just as he did the monkey let out another shriek, this one followed by several hoots.

  “Eeekheek ah! Ah! AH!” The monkey pounded its tiny chest, and bounced up and down.

  “Maybe it’s trying to tell us something?”

  Nandor took a step forward, and the monkey panted as he approached, delighted.

  “Don’t let it bite you!” Nix warned.

  As he came closer, the monkey panted softer, until he crouched down to its level. Then, it reached around and pulled out a small, half glittering half brown metallic item from where it had been sitting. It held out the key before Nandor, and smiled innocently.

  “A key?” Nix gasped.

  Nandor hesitated, not grabbing it immediately. “Do you want me to take it?” He asked the monkey, feeling silly as he did.

  As if it somehow understood, it seemed to nod, enthusiastically shaking its head up and down. He reached out, touched the key, and the monkey immediately released it into his grip. Through a questioning eyebrow, he turned to face his companions.

  “Why would the monkey give you a key to the door? Is it some sort of trick?”

  “Almost certainly.”

  “But he looks so innocent!”

  As if on cue, the monkey swayed from side to side, then ran up to Nandor’s leg, and beamed up at him.

  “I don’t trust it, sir,” Dorin said.

  Nandor judged the key for himself, looking from it, to the monkey, to the keyhole. It certainly appeared to be a match. But why would Sagger create a trapped door only to provide a monkey with a key?

  He walked to the door, and paused. The monkey looked up at him. “You wouldn’t be trying to trick me now, would you?” he asked it. Naturally, it did not reply, but its smile did grow wider. There was a flicker and it brought up another glimmering item up into its hand—Nandor did not wish to guess where the monkey had been storing it.

  It was another key, same color, but with slightly different ridges. The monkey was practically laughing as it held it up for him. Nandor took it, and examined both keys.

  “Foul little creature was holding out on us!” Dorin eyed the monkey with fire.

  “But which key is the real key?”

  “That’s the real question,” Nandor nodded at Nix. “Now the games begin.”

  The monkey hooted in laughter, “Hoah! Hohaha!”

  For a long while, Nix, Nandor and Dorin debated on which key looked best like a match for the door. They could come to no reasonable conclusion. Both keys were too similar—there were only a slight difference in their edges. The lock was too intricate on the inside to see which key was right and which key would unleash the pipe-trap. At the end of their argument, Nandor was undecided, Dorin was as well, and Nix was suggesting that perhaps both keys were rigged to set off the trap.

  “How can we trust either key?” she said, “I know Sagger best—I’ve had classes under his teachers, and I’ve encountered him more than the both of you to be sure! He’s a clever man! He wouldn’t give us a fifty-fifty chance at triggering the trap! He would rig both of the keys, only giving us the illusion of a choice!”

  “But if that’s the case, then we would be just as well off having Dorin try to pick the lock.”

  “I’d rather not!” The bot’s eyes shot up to the mysterious pipes. “Tinkering with locks as intricate as this takes time! The odds that I fit the lock right with my probing arm the first time are so low it’s absurd! We’d be better off trying a key. You understand?” It was speaking to Nix, “Lock picking requires trial and error—it’s part of the process! But here,” it gestured at the trap, “One wrong probing and woopsydaisy! Bang goes the Jack-Bot! The fire would burn and overload my core!”

  “But wouldn’t it take quite a bit of fire to get to overheat your lifestone? Or your engine?”

  Reluctantly, the bot agreed, “Yes, my new plates protect me rather well, but too much heat could still penetrate me.”

  “So either we risk using a key, or we fumble around with the lock and invariably set off the trap regardless. That about right?” Nandor asked.

  His companions did not have to reply. They were all running their own internal simulations, trying to figure the best course of action. It was Nix who proposed her idea first. “I-I could,” she stammered, walking away from the door and eyeing the monkey, “I could t-try t-to…”

  Nandor saw where she was going, and didn’t like it. “Enter the monkey’s mind to try to learn which is the real key? That could be dangerous.”

  “Any more dangerous than picking at random and risking the trap?” she asked, her resolve hardening. “As we’ve repeatedly been over—it’s a risk no matter what we do. Try a key, and maybe it will work, or maybe they are both rigged. Try to pick the lock, and we almost certainly set off the trap. However, if I use my power to enter the monkey’s mind, I believe we have our best chance of learning how to overcome the trap.”

  After a moment, the bot nodded, “I agree. We have us a mystic—might as well put her to use, no?”

  Nandor stubbornly shook his head, “You don’t understand what mind-penetration requires, Dorin. When she entered Goldie’s head she almost lost her mind—a fate worse than any death this trap might yield.”

  “Goldie?”

  “The dog,” Nix reminded it.

  “Ah. So is a monkey’s head supposed to be harder to navigate than a dog?”

  “I doubt as if any of us has the experience to say for sure,” Nandor rolled his eyes. “But judging by that monkey’s mischievous grin, he isn’t going to be an easy nut to crack.”

  Nix rolled up her sleeves, and kneeled beside the monkey. “It’s our best bet, and you know it,” she said over her shoulder. “I’m going to try it. Nandor, stay by my side and physically break my connection to the monkey if I began to go limp, or spasm, or do anything that you think is strange. Dorin, please hold the monkey steady.” She let out a sigh as she prepared her mind, rolling her head from side to side. “You still have that rek-root in your backpack, right?”

  Nandor nodded, “But I don’t want to use it if I don’t have to. Try to stay present. Enter the monkey’s mind, make it remember the moment it was given the keys, and whatever it was told, then exit as fast as possible. Don’t linger. Understand?”

  “Better than you do,” she muttered. “Everyone in position?”

  Dorin held the monkey’s arms, and grunted in reply. Nandor sat beside Nix, “Be careful,” he said.

  She slowly stretched out her hand, and then she sat it on the monkey’s soft white head. The tiny creature squeaked in protest, but then, they both appeared to relax as the mystic took control.

  ***

  The clever creature clashed with her conscious as soon as she entered. It was a struggle from the very beginning. There was no time to brace herself, and very little room to maneuver. She wiggled her way in by promising it that she would give it tasty nuts and roots when the connection was over, but the bribe only worked for a moment. She knew she had very little time to get the creature to cooperate and recall its memory.

  Swiftly, she searched for what she sought, but was bogged down by the vast cavernous hollows of its own spirited ideas.

  How does one describe the mind of a monkey?

  Chaotic. Playful. Distressed. Scattered. Erratic.

  So pretty much like the mind of a person, but more immediate. More reactive, and less ponderous.

  Aside from its scattered thoughts, there was also a hidden danger to staying inside its mind—one that she felt immediately. It was addictive. The monkey thought simple thoughts compared to a human, but they were much more complex than anything she had seen in the dog when she had entered its mind. This monkey had spirit—it had its own ideas and dreams and desires that expanded far beyond any other creature she had encountered before. It was almo
st beautiful in its simplicity, yet cruel in the same way.

  It had dreams and delusions of grandeur—it was spoiled, and so it believed itself a mighty being—powerful, wise, respected and feared.

  And why shouldn’t it think such things?

  Large men brought it food daily, as if revered and beholden to the monkey’s desires. It was bathed, cleaned, and groomed by these lesser men, who gave it a fitting cage filled with toys and trinkets to entertain it to its heart’s content.

  The monkey could sit on the men’s heads and shoulders, and ride them as it saw fit. It could climb, jump, and bite harder than any person, and it knew it, and it reasoned that this must have been why it was so well-respected by the strange hairless men.

  Nix tried to shake the monkey’s thoughts away—it was too much. Too much strange monkey-logic.

  She needed it to recall its memory, not allow it to brag to her.

  She tried to focus the monkey, but it laughed at her clumsy efforts.

  So slow! So dense! So heavy! So boring! it taunted her.

  The nerve! She furiously thought, both surprised and irritated that it could form thoughts into words so casually. I could stomp on you with my boots and you would squash like a rotten little rodent beneath me! You have no right to taunt me you pesky little thing!

  It disagreed. You could never catch me, slow fat human! I could climb outside the tower! I could run up the walls! I could jump ten feet before you could bat an eye! I could pelt you with rocks and filth and you would scream and shriek and run because I am the one in control!

  You are NOT in control! She echoed loudly throughout it.

  It screeched, and laughed, and clawed against her brain. When are you going to give me those nuts you promised?

  After you show me the memory!

  It appeared to dart away from her within its own mind. Memory…memory…memory… I do not know this word very well, it confessed through the darkness.

  I just need to know what happened when you were given the keys!

  Keys? Keys! Aha! Why did you not say? I can tell you about keys! I don’t have to show you! It coyly approached her again from the shadows, and rubbed up against her like a cat. Will you give me treats?