by Jeff Sabean
“I am Vathio Raenvree, brother of Fion Raenvree, and I have been told that he is a captive in this city and have come to negotiate...”
“SILENCE!” the woman all but screamed, although her lips barely moved, and the companions could not see her breathe at all. “You do not negotiate with the exalted, he will tell you what he wants for you to have this shadow elf returned to you.”
Di’eslo stopped, unable to breath as she was shouting at him, and when the words registered, he let out his breath in a rush.
“It is true, then? My brother lives?” he asked, hardly daring to hope it was true.
“He does. For now,” she said, an evil smile spreading across her face at his discomfort. “If he lives or dies all depends on if he is useful to my lord. Until now, he has not been. But the witch says he is the key to the portals, so he still lives.”
“What witch? What portals?” Heishi interjected. He had been trying to let his friend find out about his brother, but couldn’t stay silent any longer.
“Ahh, yes, you have the touch of the other world too, I see,” the old woman cackled. “Looking for her, are you?”
“I just wish to return home. If she can facilitate that request, then that is all I would ask. If not...” he let his voice trail off as his right hand reached across and he lightly gripped the handle of his katana.
A burst of wind rushed from the woman, pushing them all a few paces back. From every direction, skeletons came running out from the shops, drawing finely crafted weapons and surrounding the companions.
“You will not threaten one under the protection of my lord,” the woman stated, her eyes turning from white to black as she pointed her staff at Heishi. “If he does not choose to kill you himself, then his followers will at any time at his command.”
She stood still, staff pointing at Heishi. Her eyes began to change, and they appeared to have smoke swirling inside the ebony orbs as she slowly brought the staff back to her side, leaning on it once again.
“You may have your chance to speak, human,” she stated coldly. “But my lord does not speak to any who are not champions of the arena.”
“And how do I become a champion of the arena?”
“Don’t ask that, I don’t think we want to know,” Aki whispered from beside him as the old woman began to cackle.
“You will see, human, you will see.”
Chapter 11 – The Pyramid
Di’eslo was surprised that they were not disarmed as the old woman led them through the town toward the black pyramid. As more and more skeletons fell in around and behind them as they walked, he came to realize it was because they felt secure that the small group of adventurers were no threat, and not disarming them was their way of proving that.
Another statue identical to the one in Aibara adorned the center of this city, drawing stares from the companions as they walked around the roundabout and headed toward the looming center pyramid.
“Why does your lord keep the witch here?” Heishi asked the old woman as they walked, hoping to glean more information about what Aldith was up to.
“She opens the portals and monsters come through. Monsters fight in the arena, and my lord wishes to see them fight, so he allows the human to open portals.”
“Why does she open the portals here?”
“The top of the pyramid is used to open them. Much energy flows here. She thinks she can control them using our power. So far, she cannot, but she brings monsters through for the arena, which is good.”
The truth hit the humans like a ton of bricks: pyramids were used to open portals to other planes of existence. How many different conspiracy theories were there about aliens building pyramids in different parts of the world? How many different scientists had tried to answer that question to no avail? Somehow, Aldith had stumbled on the answer, and now she was using them.
“See, Top, aliens,” whispered Tiane with a grin, to which Heishi simply rolled his eyes.
“We understand that to bring anyone through a portal, someone must go first. Who does your lord send through the portals to bring monsters back through?” he asked, trying to keep the woman talking.
She stopped walking and turned to stare at Heishi, clearly thinking him an imbecile for asking such an obvious question. With a wave of her hand, she indicated the scores of skeletons marching beside them, shook her head, and continued her slow pace to the pyramid without a word.
“Smooth, brother, real smooth,” Aki murmured from beside him. “Now she thinks you’re stupid, which can’t be good for our little quest to speak to her king.”
“It seemed like a valid question considering we’ve already been forced through a portal against our will once this year.”
“Silence. No more talking,” the woman growled, not turning her head to look at them as they walked.
The entrance to the pyramid came into view as they turned the last corner of the road. The massive doors stood at least twenty feet tall and twice as wide, made from a glossy obsidian stone. Guards stood in the center of the doors, but they were not the small rat men or skeletons that they group had seen thus far, they stood around ten feet tall with the face of a lion and a human body. Each guard held a spear that was half again as tall as they were, with a bronze spike at the end and a shield of bronze as well. As they drew closer, the intricate engraving of the shields was visible: the same face that adorned the statues they had seen already emblazoned the center of the shields.
“There’s a man who is in touch with his inner narcissist,” deadpanned Hankish, drawing a glare from their guide.
As they stepped in front of the doors, they began to silently slide open as the guards stepped to the side, creating a space wide enough for the group to enter single file. The old woman led them through the center of the guards, and the skeletons turned and fled as quickly as they had appeared once they had delivered the intruders to the pyramid of their king. None of the guards looked down at the companions, but the feeling of being watched rolled over each of them as they stepped between the guards and through the open doors.
A long narrow tunnel opened before them, as wide as the doors they walked through and lit every few paces with torches that glowed brightly, sending shadows splashing around the room. No exits were visible as they walked into the tunnel; it simply stopped at the end with another obsidian wall, the glossy finish reflecting the torch light. Without a sound, the doors slid closed behind them, trapping them in the tunnel.
The old woman stopped about halfway down the tunnel, turning to face the group.
“You go there,” she stated simply, pointing to her left.
Di’eslo took a step in the direction indicated, seeing nowhere to go. He shifted his vision to a thermal level, looking for heat signatures, but saw only the torches.
“Go where, lady?” he asked, continuing to search for any missing detail.
“There. Go,” was all the response he received.
Shrugging his shoulders, he took a few steps toward the wall, the rest of the team following him as he carefully placed each step, expecting a trap at any time. He scanned the floor in the thermal range, but saw no heat signatures of footprints or cracks in the flat black stone.
“Master Tiane?” he said, the unspoken request indicating the sniper should use his innate night vision to assist in scanning for traps.
“I got nothing, Di’eslo. Just solid rock,” came the expected response.
They walked slowly toward the wall, and when Di’eslo came within an arm’s reach of the wall, the stone slid to the side, revealing a doorway to another tunnel beyond. The tunnel was narrower, just wide enough for a human sized being to walk through without bumping either wall, and leaving no room to fight if necessary. The group paused, staring into the doorway for traps.
“Go. NOW!” came the command from behind them.
“I guess there’s no choice here, brother,” Heishi stated quietly. “If they wanted to kill us, they would have done it already without leading us here i
nto a trap. This is your show since he’s your brother, and we’ll follow you if that’s where you decide we should go.”
Nodding, Di’eslo silently stepped through the doorway, leading them single file down the narrow hallway. They made it twenty feet down the hall when the ground abruptly disappeared beneath their feet, dropping each member of the group down a separate hole in the floor.
After a fall of about five feet, Di’eslo found himself inside a tube too narrow to move his arms, rocketing downward at an alarming rate. He was whipped into turns, sometimes up, sometimes down, until he had lost track of how far he had traveled.
Unexpectedly, he found himself deposited into a cage; the door slamming shut behind him as he fell into it. He was surrounded by pitch black, and as he shifted his vision through every wavelength of light possible, he could see nothing. He was still armed, but even when he called on the innate power of his flail and shield, the normal purple glow was not visible inside the cage. He tentatively reached above him and touched the top less than a foot above his head, and reaching to the sides he could feel all four sides of the cage with outstretched arms.
“Where am I?” he yelled, his voice sounding small in the darkness. It was as if he were yelling into a blanket, the sound being muffled immediately upon exiting his lips.
Vathio Raenvree had lived for almost a century underground, and yet he had never felt darkness this oppressive. Had he lived on the surface for too long? Was he becoming soft? He couldn’t fear the dark, could he?
He yelled a few more times, hoping for some answer, but the result was the same each time: nothing. As panic began to set in, he decided it would do no good to cause a scene, so he sat down, resting his back against the bars of the cage. They were watching him, he could feel it, but he could not figure out HOW they could see when he could see nothing.
Immediately after he sat, he was surrounded in blinding light. It seemed to come from every direction at once, leaving no shadows anywhere around him. He still could not see a thing, the intense light burning his retinas, and when he jumped to his feet he was once again cloaked in darkness.
“Cute trick,” he grumbled, the sound of his voice sounding foreign to him. “If you wanted me to remain standing, all you had to do was ask.”
Seething, he stood in the center of the cage, refusing to move. In his head, he began to count to track the passage of time while he waited to see what would come next.
Chapter 12 – The Arena
According to his internal count, Di’eslo had been imprisoned for over three hours when the light appeared around him again. At first, it was as bright as when he had sat down, but gradually it dimmed and he began hearing the cheering of a crowd as the light dimmed. The lower the light, the louder the cheering, and he began to make out shapes in the light.
As the light dimmed, he could see that he was in fact in a cage, and that his cage was built into the wall of a massive arena. The floor was covered in sand, with blood of different colors splattered over the top of it. He estimated the arena floor was several hundred feet long and half again as wide to create an oval shape, with stadium seats reaching up for as high as he could see in the blinding light. In the stadium, he could hear a crowd chanting, but the words were foreign to him as he attempted to make them out. The only word he understood of the chant was “Rattanda,” the name of their god-king.
Looking left and right, he could see the rest of his group trapped in cages identical to his, each one perfectly sized for their height, including a tiny cage for Zatus the gnome. His companions were each blinking as they looked around the room, eyes adjusting to the sudden brightness. He made eye contact with each one, ensuring they were all just as safe as he, then turned back to study the arena.
Unless he was mistaken, the roof of the pyramid was open, the sun directly overhead providing the light, which was then reflected from hundreds of mirrors spread around the arena, creating the dizzying effect of light coming from everywhere at once. The shadows from his skin began circling his body, shielding him from the overwhelming brightness as he reached out with his mind, searching for the inevitable shadows created by so many light sources.
Suddenly, a glowing dome of yellow energy appeared over the arena floor, and he could no longer sense anything beyond the barrier. The sound of the crowd died as the barrier appeared as well, and the color became deeper as it set in place, blocking out his view of all but the box seats directly in front of him.
“Welcome, visitors,” a nasal voice echoed through the arena floor. “The guardian has informed us that you wish an audience with the exalted King Rattanda. This is not possible until you prove your worth to him.”
The speaker’s voice was not loud, but it carried across the floor to the prisoners easily. The voice was male, and he spoke with a slight lisp as if he had recently lost teeth and was still adjusting to the sensation. It was not an arrogant voice, but rather had a sniveling sycophant quality to it.
Without warning, a cloud of smoke slipped across the arena from the box seats and became a humanoid form in front of the cages. Before them now stood a male dressed in a bright orange satin robe that matched the color of the sashes the guards at the port had worn. This one was clearly someone of some importance, as his robe was covered in tiny gem orange gemstones, which glittered in the light as he moved. To say he was pale would be to understate his complexion, as his skin was so white it would virtually glow in the dark. Even his hair was white, pulled back into a tidy braid that he had pulled over his shoulder. His thin face wore a smirk as he looked at each prisoner in turn, his light pink eyes looking each up and down before moving to the next. As he studied the prisoners, he twirled the braided hair in his left hand, his fingernails long and resembling claws more than nails.
“Do you wish to know how you will prove your worth?” the nasal voice continued, and now that Di’eslo could see him, he could see fangs in the man’s mouth, which caused the slight lisp while he spoke.
“I assume we will fight in the arena?” Di’eslo stated calmly, drawing the pink eyes back to himself.
“Such a smart one, you are,” came the reply with a small giggle. “Each of you who wishes an audience with my king will be required to fight. If you do not wish such an audience, speak now, and you can run and hide in the stands to watch like a worm.”
“Is that a vampire?” Aki asked from a few cages to the shadow elf’s left side.
“More like a glampire,” replied Hankish with a snort. “I bet if you toss him in the sunlight outside that dome he’d just positively sparkle.”
As the companions each chuckled at the thought, a pink tone crept into the vampire’s cheeks, clearly embarrassed by the mocking.
“You no longer have the option to fight!” he screamed, pointing at Hankish with a pale, bony finger. “You will fight me, and I will feast on you tonight!”
“Well, it would seem that my whole afternoon has just been ruined! I’ve never been someone’s meal before. I should warn you, I eat a lot of spicy food, so if your tummy gets upset easily, I wouldn’t eat too much at once,” the bard taunted, earning a glare from each of his companions. “Why don’t you let me out of this cage so we can get this over with, I am sure you have better things to do than waste your day worrying about one as small as I!”
“Silence!” screeched the vampire, and suddenly Hankish’s cage disappeared. “King Rattanda reserves the right of first blood each day. I will deal with the little one after my lord destroys his opponent.”
“If I may,” Di’eslo interrupted as the vampire turned his back on them, causing him to spin back to the cages with a scowl. “My companions followed me here. As your king reserves the right of first blood, so do I reserve the right to fight before my companions. You may attack my bard after you give me a fight to prove my worth.”
The vampire stared at the elf, visibly shaking in his fury.
“So be it,” came the reply, then the vampire turned to smoke and drifted back to the box seats acro
ss from the cages.
Hankish appeared again after the vampire disappeared, a grin on his face.
“Did you HAVE to taunt him?” asked Di’eslo, an annoyed look on his face.
“No, I didn’t HAVE to taunt him. But I WANTED to taunt him,” came the reply as the little bard grinned at the elf.
“I hope you know what you are doing...”
The sound of the crowd came bursting through the arena again, interrupting whatever he was about to say next. They were chanting the name of their king, who was slowly stalking to the center of the arena from the box seats. The dome remained opaque, blocking out the sunlight and the view of the crowd, but the cheers now reached their ears.
King Rattanda appeared exactly as the statues the group had seen of him. The height had been exaggerated, as he stood closer to seven feet tall, but he was just as well-muscled as the stone had shown. He wore the same headdress of an Egyptian pharaoh, and in his right hand he loosely held a massive sword. What shocked the companions was that his right arm appeared to be made completely of bone, which had not shown on either statue. It was shaped exactly like a regular arm, the muscles even moving as he took a few swings of his sword to loosen up, but it was made of bone.
“Now entering the arena is one who needs no introduction! Our lord and undefeated champion, the ruler of all his eyes behold, the one, the only, King Rattanda!” the voice of the weaselly little vampire shouted, being drowned out by the cheers at the end of his introduction.
When the cheers died down, the voice continued:
“And now, his opponent, the first to die today. Having been summoned from a dimension unknown, this beast devoured SIX of our guards while being subdued. No mortal could attempt to look this beast in the eye and live, but our lord IS NO MORTAL! Watch, as this monster meets its DOOM!”
With that, the cheers of the crowd became deafening as a cage appeared on the far end of the arena. This cage was enormous, with a writhing mass of purple flesh just barely visible inside.
