Two dozen sapphire dragons with mounted Knights dived from above the clouds, spitting lightning bolts into the horde, sometimes swooping low enough for the riders to attack with their long lances. No sooner had they flown out of range then a similar force took their place. With the lid on the box, the chaos horde lost what little semblance of order they'd ever had, descending ironically into chaos. The terrified creatures hacked and slashed at one another in a futile attempt to escape and flee. The damage they were inflicting on themselves was almost as much as that being done by the Knights.
The box pushed gradually inward, the dimensions shrinking as the numbers inside diminished. The Knights never allowed the creatures any space to move, but squashed them ever closer together, fuelling the chaos and panic within. Never did a single Knight come close to being swept inside that churning mass of death, such was their discipline. There were Knight casualties, inevitably, but they were few in number and the Knight Clerics were quickly on the scene to rescue and heal the fallen. Many returned to the battle within moments.
The Knights' clean lines never faltered. Tactical reserves were sent in to reinforce them before there was any real danger of a breach. All the while, the cavalry continued to pound in from behind like a great battering ram, shoving more and more enemies onto the long pikes at what Phaer arbitrarily thought of as the front end. The pike weapons were ideally suited to this task - this was what they were designed to do. The chaos creatures simply couldn't get close enough to strike at their wielders and trapped insode the box as they were, they couldn't outflank the Knights. The archers and slingers were mostly out of ammunition by this stage, but the dragon cavalry were more than enough to provide aerial bombardment.
At the start of the battle, Bunny had feared this would be a short fight. On reflection, she was absolutely right...and absolutely wrong. It was indeed a rout, but the victory belonged to the Knights of Balance. The bards would sing of this day for ages to come...assuming any of them survived the larger war. Almost before they knew it, the battle was over.
Chapter 16
Upon stepping through the doorway, Eilidh and her small group were met by a powerful gust of wind, carrying with it the stench of rotting flesh. Eilidh wanted to gag. Tuning in her magical senses, the young woman tried to determine how the corridor they were in had been constructed. The impression she got was...well...she wasn't exactly sure what her impression was. She consulted Granite as both a fellow Catalyst and a dwarf with strong cultural ties to subterranean construction. He was equally baffled.
“If it was constructed with tool and muscle alone, then their skills and methods were far beyond anything I've seen in dwarf history,” Granite admitted grudgingly.
“And if they used magic?” Eilidh pressed
“Then it's magic so alien that I cannae recognise it. Sorry I cannae be more helpful to ye.”
Eilidh smiled but said nothing aloud. Alien, Eilidh mused silently. An interesting choice of words.
Further reflection was cut short, however, as their torchlight fell upon a message scrawled on the wall in what appeared to be blood.
“Eilidh,” Toli said, with a tremor in her voice, “I think it's for you.”
Leaning closer, the Catalyst read the words:
Turn ye back, Du y Kharia!
Death awaiteth ye here.
Thy search here is meaningless.
Turn ye back!
“They’re quite keen for us to go away ain’t they, Miss Eilidh?” Jayne observed.
Undaunted by that grizzly writing, Eilidh was adamant that they were going to press on. A short distance further down that perfect straight-line passage brought them to a second door, similar to the one they had just used, except this one had a clear hand panel to one side that would open it.
A final greenish warning admonished them:
Turn ye back, Du y Kharia!
Enter not, O Lost Soul.
Disturb not the Spirits
Turn ye back!
With a cavalier shrug, Eilidh ignored the advice completely and hit her palm against the door switch. A whole section of wall rose rapidly in response.
“Our quest lies this way,” she said to her hesitant friends. “Coming?”
Only a few paces down the continuing corridor, the door slid shut with a boom that echoed throughout the crypt.
“Miss Eilidh, I thought dat guard said anyone could get in ‘ere now?” Jayne asked, confused. “Exactly,” Granite gruffed. “He said anyone could get in - he did nae say a word about gettin' out! And that means anyone who gets in here will be trapped in here with us...and we'll be trapped in here with them...if ye take my meanin'.”
Jayne scoffed, “Who else’d be way out ‘ere?”
“Oh, someone who wants whatever's in here as much as we do, I'd imagine,” Eilidh answered.
“The Enemy!” gasped the half-orc. “Fortunately, no,” Eilidh disputed, shaking her head. “I get the impression that she is not one to get her hands dirty if she can avoid it. She has people working for her,” she reasoned. “So we're far more likely to run into agents of hers like we did at Marina Fells.”
“We'd best stay sharp then, eh, Miss Eilidh?” Jayne remarked.
“Always,” Eilidh agreed. Eilidh was concerned about her hobbit friend. Toli had been unusually quiet since they'd entered the crypt and seemed to be retreating deeper into a shell with every step. The Catalyst was learning something of people management on this journey, and she sensed her friend would not want to discuss whatever was troubling her in front of the others. Therefore, she asked both of their companions to scout ahead - carefully. Jayne was unhappy about leaving her rear guard station, but accepted Eilidh's reasons.
“Nothing can come at us from behind without coming through that door,” the Catalys t pointed out. “Remember the noise it makes? If you hear that, run straight back here. Otherwise, you know we're safe.”
It also wouldn't do any harm, she added to herself, to give dwarf and half-orc a chance to work out their differences.
Once the pair were out of earshot, Eilidh moved close to her friend. “Are you alright, Toli?” she asked.
The hobbit gave a weak smile. “I'm not fond of enclosed, underground places,” she remarked.
“You didn't seem to object to the Marina Fells Mine,” countered the Catalyst.
“True, but most of the time I could at least feel the draught from the entrance and besides, we were fighting so much, I didn't have time to worry about it.”
“Oh, so you'd feel better if we were being attacked?”
“Eh? Oh well, no, of course not, it's just-”
“So would I,” Eilidh told her. There now. She'd said it. In talking to Toli about her fears, she had found the words to express her own.
Toli's jaw dropped. “You're serious?” she demanded, incredulously.
“Quite serious. Think about it: We've now been warned three times about some terrible danger lurking in this place-”
“-Warnings you seem to be ignoring,” Toli put in.
“I’m not ignoring them, I’m dismissing them," Eilidh replied. "There’s a difference. This place has been abandoned for a very long time and so these warnings are obviously equally old.”
“So they don’t matter?” “No, the danger they’re warning us about may be very real, but there is no such thing as prophecy. All you can do is extrapolate the future from your knowledge of history and current events; plan and strategise for the future as best you can. With Temporal magic you can even simulate possible future paths, but ultimately whoever put up these signs couldn’t possibly have known the exact current situation.”
“But the Wise One does.” Toli nodded in understanding. “So you’ve decided his instructions take priority. That makes sense. There could be all kinds of situations when coming here would be a bad idea, but given current events, the Wise One must believe it’s the right thing to do.”
“Exactly,” Eilidh agreed. “That’s the judgement call he made and he
’s the best source of information I have right now, so I’m choosing to trust him. But no, I’m certainly not ignoring the warnings. In fact, I’m deeply worried about them. They’re telling us it’s dangerous down here and it should be dangerous, so how come we're just strolling along here having a nice friendly little chat? Yes, I would feel better if we were being attacked, because that would be normal. Something’s wrong here. It makes no sense. Your claustrophobia isn’t irrational, Toli: in enclosed spaces there's nowhere to run.”
“No offence, Eilidh, but that really didn't help much.”
The young woman laughed. “No, I don't suppose it did. Anything else on your mind that I can singularly fail to help you with?”
“Not right now, thanks, but I'll let you know if-”
She never got to finish her sentence as a small group of skeletal warriors pulled themselves up from the ground behind them. Taking discretion as the better part of valour, the two friends ran deeper into the crypt, calling for Granite and Jayne, but they were stopped in their tracks by a quartet of zombies that shuffled into view a short distance ahead.
“Don't worry,” Toli assured her friend. “I've been studying the books Prince Garald gave me.”
“The spell books?” “Oh they're much more than that. They're actually complete tutorials,” she explained. “Study manuals designed for learning outside the classroom. Anyway, I've learned quite a bit,” she continued, with a glint in her eye. “So you see, we're not so defenceless as we were back in Marina Fells.”
Concentrating on the lead group - the group that was cutting them off from the rest of their team - Toli focussed her magician's powers. The result was a small, concussive explosion, setting fire to the slow approaching zombies. As a magician, of course, she could not actually create fire - that was conjuror territory. Instead, the magician's approach was to increase the concentration of natural flammable gases in the air surrounding the enemies. The zombies themselves generated the stray spark that caused ignition.
“Yes!” Toli cried. Unfortunately, being undead, they were not slowed by physical pain, even when the remains of their hair, skin and ragged clothing were set alight. Onward they came, slow but steady, with the skeletal warriors ever narrowing the companions' space.
Toli was about to launch another spell, when there came a combined orcish screech and dwarven battle cry. For a moment, one zombie's torso sprouted a battle-axe, then it was cleaved in two by a curved sword, the twin to which skewered a neighbouring zombie's blackened heart. It had not even hit the ground before a third zombie was reduced to a bloody pulp from a thousand cuts from the scimitars dancing in Jayne Corr's deft hands. Granite Longbeard appeared then, amputating the remaining zombie's legs at the same time as the half-orc decapitated it. It squirmed on the ground for a moment, then lay still.
“Sorry about the delay, lassies,” Granite huffed, retrieving his second axe. “We ran into a few more of these up that way.”
“Dat passage just kept goin’ in a straight line, by the way,” added Jayne. “Pretty pointless if you ask me!” “Aye, right to a dead end. Anyway, as I say, we ran into a few o' these zombie types and we were just finishin' the job when we heard yer cries...what the-?” He trailed off as he saw the approaching skeletal band.
“We found a chest,” Jayne remarked, as she visually assessed the enemies, “wiv some pretty fine weapons in it.”
“Aye, we did,” Granite agreed. “Always good tae have spare weapons an' it looks like we'll be puttin' 'em tae good use!”
Jayne grinned. “Let's get to it, then, mate! Bet I can kill more than you!”
The dour dwarf actually belly-laughed at that. “Yer on! Clanna na cui!” With that war cry, he launched himself forward at the enemy, singing at the top of his rich bard's voice.
The two warriors chopped apart the animated skeletons, despatching them in short order, but from the dust that fell to the ground, more were spawned to take their place.
Toli looked on, frustrated. No magic she had learned was going to help much here. “Eilidh,” the hobbit began, keeping her eyes firmly on the battle in case one bag of bones decided to make a break for them as the more vulnerable members of their party. “I'm afraid my magic's not much use to us right now, and our friends can't keep holding them off indefinitely, but I don't know what else we can do!”
When the Catalyst didn't immediately answer, Toli turned around, discovering that her friend had left her side. Eilidh was ignoring the battle completely in favour of examining the wall to one side. She was running her right hand along the smooth surface and periodically tapping the wall with the staff in her left.
“Eilidh? Did you hear what I just said? I mean I don't mind repeating if you didn't, but you might have told me you were going to wander off, it's not good for me to be talking to myself you know and...Eilidh? What are you doing?”
“I heard you perfectly,” Eilidh said by way of answer. “And you're absolutely right. We're not going to get out of this with magic or weapons.”
“Then what have we got left?” “Our minds, Toli. That's all we ever have, really. Magic and swords are just tools. It's our minds that are the true weapons. Use your head, Toli! Think! This passage keeps on running in straight line to a dead end, right?”
“That's what Granite and Jayne said, but I don't see-”
“But this is some kind of temple or crypt or something. It's a building that people once used, yes?”
“Granted, so?”
“So who uses a single, straight, empty corridor? It doesn't make sense.”
“Now you come to mention it, no it doesn't really, does it?” Toli agreed.
“Which means there must be a hidden door around here somewhere.” “OK, but if we assume this was once a place of magic built by the Ancients, wouldn't they have naturally hidden it with their magic? If that's the case, feeling for it won't help and we don't have the right kind of magic, so I guess we're screwed.”
“Maybe you and I don't have the right kind of magic,” Eilidh considered, “but maybe someone else we know does.”
The two warriors were still holding their own against the skeletal soldiers, but of course, one of them wasn't just a warrior - he was a bard.
“Hey Granite!” Eilidh called out.
“Hey yerself! Have ye got any bright ideas on gettin' out of this, yet? I'm winnin’ the count by two, but I cannae keep this up all day!”
“Maybe you won't have to. How do you feel about giving us a tune?”
“Ye want me tae sing?” Granite wondered, parrying a skeleton's blow with his axe and snapping a spinal column with his other fist. “Any special requests?”
“I'm not sure, do you have anything that might show up any magically hidden doors?”
“Aye, lass, I've got just the thing.” Clearing his throat, his rich baritone filled the entire tunnel with the ethereal Watchwood Melody, used to seek out things that were hidden in the dark.
Within moments, a pinkish-purple hue developed at a point just within view on the left hand side of the tunnel.
“Well done, Granite!” Toli enthused, applauding and jumping up and down, quite forgetting the danger. A walk of just a few steps revealed it was indeed a hidden door. Eilidh tried the handle - it was unlocked. She mimed for Toli to be ready with a spell in case there was something waiting behind, but the passageway was empty.
At Eilidh's signal, Granite and Jayne made one last frenzied attack to force the skeletons back a pace, before running to meet with their companions.
The skeletons were not sprinters, so even the short-legged dwarf could outpace them easily enough. Not taking any chances, Eilidh was ready to slam the door shut as soon as all four were safely on the other side. The Catalyst's theory that the door would be invisible to the skeletons' undead eyes appeared to be accurate.
“There you are, Eilidh” Toli said. “Now we’ve been attacked. Happy?”
“Yes!”
“Well I’m glad yer enjoying yerself!” Granite gru
mbled. “I’m happy because I think I’m starting to figure this place out,” Eilidh replied, cryptically, and without a word of explanation, the Catalyst pressed on relentlessly, eager to examine the wonders that lay beyond.
* * * * * In accordance with Ganieda's instructions, Rochelle allowed Artisho to lead her through the South facing door and down the spiral staircase beyond. The magical light that lit this windowless stairwell flickered wildly, which made Rochelle feel a little queasy. She kept her stomach in check, however, and concentrated on securing her footing on each step. The stairs seemed to go on forever, taking them down to the basement. This worried Rochelle, because as far as she knew, there was only one thing in the basement of Merlyon's Central Library of Magic. When they finally reached the bottom, the druid's suspicions were confirmed. They were in a large circular room, with magical symbols of power etched into the white marble walls, floor and high domed ceiling. Dominating the room was a raised dais, upon which stood half a dozen statues. Except that they weren't statues - they were people: or at least they used to be. This was the Chamber of the Damned. It was the place where the most infamous renegade mages in Majaos history had been executed. Individuals who were decreed by the Council of Magic to be too dangerous to be allowed to live...or even to die.
Back in the days of necromancy, of course, it was entirely possible for a powerful mage to cause trouble even from beyond the grave. Therefore these vile people were sentenced to the Turning
- a kind of living death. Outwardly, they were turned to stone, but it was much more than a simple stoning. The spell - known only to the Executioner - left the soul trapped in limbo, neither in the world of the living nor the afterlife. Not even the most gifted necromancers at the height of their power could contact one who had been punished in this way, and it was absolutely irreversible. But in case anyone should try some sort of mischief, the only people allowed down there were the leaders of the three divisions of magic and the Executioner - along with their Catalysts, of course. For anyone else caught down here, the penalty was death. Ordinarily, high security magic barred entry to unauthorised personnel, but now all magic in Merlyon City was failing.
Consequences (Majaos Book 2) Page 17
