Mik and Ula whirled in a frenzy, fighting back-to-back, swinging their weapons and waving their hands, trying to ward off the thousands of miniscule predators. The tiny crustaceans kept coming.
“I’ve heard of the death of a thousand cuts,” Mik said, “hut I didn’t think it was administered by crabs.”
“Where’s Shimmer?” Ula asked. “We need Shimmer!” Mik looked around, but the entangling weeds and the swarm of crabs obscured his vision. “I don’t see him,” he said. “Let’s fight our way to the temple. The tunnel opens up ahead.”
“Right! Ouch!”
“A crab get you?”
“No. I stabbed my leg on this gods-forsaken coral.”
They swam toward the glow from the temple, struggling to avoid the weeds and the razor-sharp coral. Against the swarming, nipping crabs, they made slow progress.
Just as they seemed about to break through, the water around them went dark. A swirling black cloud surrounded them. Horrible shapes lurked in the cloud—things Mik had only glimpsed in the darkest corners of his mind: swarming scavenger eels; black horsemen riding across the desert with scimitars raised high; the mangled, decaying body of old Poul.
Mik tried to swim away, but the nightmares surrounded him. Something grabbed his wrist in the dark. A voice boomed, “Mik!”
He tried to pull away, but the thing’s webbed fingers gripped him like iron. He slashed down with his sword, trying to cut the arm off. “Hey! Watch it!” the voice thundered.
A blue fist flashed out of the darkness and clouted him on the jaw.
Stars flashed before his eyes, and then both the horrible visions and the black cloud vanished. Ula Drakenvaal held Mik’s wrist tightly in her blue fingers.
“It was Shimmer,” she said, shaking him lightly. “He drove the crabs away.” She pointed to an ethereal white cloud of crustaceans receding into the distance.
Mik nodded, remembering what Shimmer had done to Lord Kell’s crew on the deck of Red Wake. Now he knew what it felt like to be on the receiving end. Shimmer hovered nearby, rubbing his left shoulder.
“Where are the others?” Mik asked.
Shimmer peered into the darkness up the canyon. “They’re coming,” he said. “All but the kender.”
A cold hand gripped Mik’s heart. “Trip!” he called. “Where are you?”
“Here lam!” the kender’s happy voice replied. He zipped back into view from beyond the weedy tunnel. “I tried to get the crabs to follow me, but it didn’t work. Sorry.”
“No apologies necessary,” Mik said.
Kell and his warriors returned. Karista Meinor looked very frightened, and her diving briefs hung in tatters, but she didn’t seem much the worse for wear. The brass lord brushed pieces of crab from his armor. Kell’s two warriors trailed behind, tending to their armor and numerous small cuts. The woman looked badly shaken, and the man was very pale.
“Everyone accounted for?” Mik asked.
Kell nodded.
“Good. Let’s get moving before the crabs come back.” Mik turned and swam toward the temple; the others followed.
The thorny coral passageway opened up, and the weeds fell away on each side. Before them, the Temple, in all its drowned glory, rose from the abyssal canyon.
Billowing towers of white steam, ghostly sentinels, surrounded the sunken edifice. Columns of marble and crystal jutted up like broken teeth from the silty sea bottom. Piled on top of them lay the domes of the temple, splendid even in their decay.
Eerie, black-bodied fish with glowing eyes populated the submerged building. Funereal processions of shroudlike jellyfish and squid wound through the columns, slowly chasing one another through the bubbling water.
It was hot. Mick felt the heat even through the enchantment that protected him from the cold pressure of the deep. People did not belong here. Rather, the temple was a stygian landscape reserved for the lost, the cursed, and the drowned. The huge domes and columns looked like titanic cracked eggshells crouching atop piles of bleached bones. These strange tombstones stood in silent procession amid a landscape of pale weeds and broken flagstones. Only the farthest reaches of the temple, at the edge of sight, seemed to retain any cohesion. All the rest looked ravaged, as though by an ancient, undersea war.
Mik looked around the group, to see if anyone else shared his apprehension. Only one of Kell’s brass warriors, standing near the back, fidgeted nervously. The other stood in rapt attention, gazing at the wonders of the ancient structure.
“It’s beautiful,” said Trip.
“And deadly,” Mik added.
“Aye,” said Ula.
“Why build it so deep?” Lord Kell asked.
“Dragons are people of the sea as well as sky,” Shimmer replied.
“It may have sunk more since the building as well,” Mik added. “It’s certainly suffered over the years.”
“It’s still beautiful,” said Trip.
They all stood there for a long moment, drinking in the glory of the submerged temple.
Karista finally broke the silence. “Where do we look for the key?” she asked.
“It’s somewhere in the temple,” Mik said. “Probably the innermost precincts nearest the mountain. The Temple of the Sky was atop the volcano.”
“To treasure now ascend, ” quoted Karista.
They took their bearings and swam toward the undersea slopes of the ancient volcano. Far overhead, they saw the shadows of the thorny coral, arching over the temple and forming a cave-like dome.
“I think I see it,” Trip called, flashing ahead of them. “But it’s a bit of a wreck.”
At the base of the mountain, the temple’s blue domes lay smashed and broken like titanic cracked eggshells amid the sturdy columns. The treasure hunters swam swiftly toward the shattered dome at the top of the temple complex. Trip circled the remains of the dome twice before the others arrived.
They hovered a moment outside. Then—taking a deep breath—Mik swam forward through the cracked dome and into the chamber beyond. Ula and the others followed.
Rubble filled the room’s interior. Broken shards of the dome, sand, and pieces of coral littered the floor, nearly filling the room.
“Ouch!” said Ula.
“What?” Mik asked. “More coral?”
“No,” she said. “This accursed thing just got hot.” She unlaced the bejeweled key from the golden chains at her waist and held it in her hand. It glowed brightly.
“The final key must be close,” Mik said. “Maybe under the rubble.”
“You’re right,” Trip said. “Look at my treasure finder!” The trinket was spinning so fast that it churned the water into a froth.
The others settled on the temple floor and began to dig frantically.
“You,” Kell said, pointing to the rearmost guard, “stand watch. Warn us if anything approaches.”
The guard, looking pale and vaguely unsettled behind his brass helmet, nodded and swam back out of the opening. He took up a position near the top of the dome, swimming in slow circles and scanning the surrounding ocean.
Silt quickly clouded the waters of the chamber as the treasure hunters pushed aside the detritus of centuries.
“I’ve found it!” Mik cried, breaking caked mud off some hidden object.
The others gathered ’round as Mik brushed away the last bits of debris.
In his palm lay an intricate golden lacework, similar to the artifacts in Ula’s hand. In its center rested a large, glowing ruby.
“This is it!” Mik said. “The final key!”
Thirty-Seven
The Silver Stairway
Everyone in the room stood silently for a moment, and all eyes fixed upon the glittering ruby.
“You do the honors,” Ula said quietly, handing her portions of the key to Mik.
Willing his hands not to tremble, Mik joined the final segment of the key to the first three. As he did, the temple shuddered and the key shone with a blue-white brilliance as intense as sunl
ight on a summer day.
Mik squeezed his eyes shut against the blinding glare and, when he opened them again, the light had died away. As his vision cleared, on the far side of the room he saw a set of massive silver doors that had not been there before. The portals were carved with the likenesses of sea creatures, people, and dragons. They had no doorhandles; only a single large keyhole marred the sculptures on their surface.
“The doors to the Temple of the Sky,” he said. The others nodded, too stunned to say anything—even Trip.
Finally, Karista Meinor broke the silence. “Open them,” she said, rubbing her long fingers together in anticipation.
Mik swam across the room and inserted the key into the doors’ immense lock. As he turned it, all of reality seemed to tremble. The room shook, and he felt lightning coursing up his arms and into his brain. In his mind, he saw an enormous blue-white diamond hovering in the air before him. Lights flashed inside his eyes, and thunder roared in his ears.
Slowly and without a sound, the giant metal doors parted.
At first, all any of them saw beyond the doors was the ruined temple and the craggy mountainside beyond. Then, like ice melting from a windowpane, the rocks faded away, revealing a long silver staircase.
The stair was wide enough for dragons, but its smooth treads were spaced on a more human scale. The risers supporting it were carved in the same elaborate manner as the silver doors. The stairway stretched up, out of the ocean deep to the fiery cleft in the volcano rim above. At the top of the stair, its white pillars looking as new as if it had been made yesterday, lay the Temple of the Sky.
“Wonders upon wonders,” gasped Mik.
The stairway was immensely long, but there were terraces or plazas along the way—each one surrounded by pillars, forming a kind of miniature open temple.
“Up we go,” Mik said. He tucked the key in his belt and swam through the silver doors and up to the stairway.
“Don’t forget your man outside,” Ula said to Kell, before following the sailor. Trip darted ahead of her and reached the stairway at the same time as Mik. As the kender headed for the stairs, though, he dived facedown onto the treads. “Ouch!” he cried.
Mik swam to help him, and nearly tumbled down himself. He landed on all fours, and then stood before helping Trip up.
“There’s an enchantment on the stairway,” Mik called to the rest. “Trying to swim over it is like fighting your way up a waterfall.” He took a few tentative steps up the stairway. “It seems easy enough to walk, though.”
“One does not swim up a temple stairway,” Shimmer noted.
Mik and Trip began walking upward toward the first plaza. Ula and Shimmer followed, then the female guard, then Karista and Kell. Finally, the pale guard who had been stationed outside the temple brought up the rear. He walked tentatively, glancing from side to side, peering into the deep as he came.
They reached the first terrace, and Mik bobbed quickly across. “The spell doesn’t affect the plazas,” he said. “We can swim normally here.”
The group took a moment to relax and admire the decrepit splendor of the sunken temple below. Kell’s male guard took the lead as they ascended the stairs once more, while the female brass warrior brought up the rear.
They passed beyond the thorny ceiling overarching the submerged temple and trench just before they reached the next plaza. The waters around them became less dark, and the sea life grew more numerous. Spotted dominoes swam overhead, beyond the reach of the stair’s enchantment.
“Watch out for predators,” Kell told his warriors. The brass-armored man and woman nodded their understanding.
As they reached the third platform, the surface of the sea became visible above them. A supernatural clarity surrounded the stairs themselves—and the path to the volcano’s rim appeared as lucid as gazing across the ocean on a cloud- free day.
In the area surrounding the stair, though, local conditions prevailed. The storm brewing in the sky above churned up the water, making it translucent and opaque. Thunderheads gathered over the mountain, though a tiny circle of blue sky shone through above the distant temple.
Kell’s lead guard forged ahead while the others rested. Hiking up the steps was as tedious as it would have been on land—and the stairway was far longer than the climb to the Dragonheights.
Mik leaned against a pillar and caught his breath. The next plaza was above the waves, and the weather there looked none too pleasant. Ula swam lazy circles around the perimeter of the area, stretching her long limbs. Trip kept pace beside her, using the ancient power of his sea serpent cloak.
Kell and Karista Meinor stood close together, between Mik and the ascending stairway. Shimmer sat on a coral bench opposite, rubbing his wounded shoulder. Kell’s brass- armored woman warrior stood atop the descending steps, watching the way they’d come.
“Let’s keep moving,” Mik said. “We don’t have much daylight left.” He headed for the stairs once more, and the others followed.
A shape flashed past ahead of them, beyond the plaza’s massive columns. Mik turned and saw the tail fin of a mangier shark angle up, over the stairway. He wondered, briefly, why Kell’s advance guard hadn’t warned them about the predator.
The next instant, the brass guard shot down the stairway like a man surfing a powerful wave. Sharks and razorfish, each with a small Turbidus leech attached to its spine, followed him. The guard streaked across the terrace, his brass spear pointed at Lord Kell’s back. Kell’s other guard stepped in front of her master, and the traitor thrust his spear into the female warrior’s gut
The woman gasped, and her weapon fell from her hand onto the coral flagstones below. The guard cursed in a guttural voice and yanked out his spear. The woman warrior hung limply in the water, dead.
Lord Kell spun, a cry on his lips. His outrage echoed through the brine as everyone in the plaza drew their weapons. The evil fish swarmed down the stairs and attacked.
Kell stood between Mik and the traitor, but a mangier shark buffeted the lord aside. It was all Kell could do to avoid being bitten in half. The renegade guard flashed by his master, headed straight toward Mik.
Mik cursed himself for not noticing the guard’s odd demeanor earlier. He brought up his sword to defend himself. The traitor batted Mik’s weapon aside and, on the back- swing, deftly knocked the Key to the Temple of the Sky from Mik’s belt.
The artifact spun through the water and landed near the renegade’s feet. The traitor stabbed at Mik, and the sailor dived back. The guard stooped to retrieve the fallen key.
Mik lunged forward and slashed at the man’s exposed spear-arm. The scimitar found its target, and the guard’s flesh ripped off in a long pale ribbon, revealing the scales beneath.
Shocked at the sight, Mik hesitated, and the imposter’s counterattack nearly impaled him. Fortunately, XJla dove in and shoved the sailor out of the way. She thrust her spear up into the brass warrior’s crystal faceplate. The helmet, and the warrior’s dead face beneath, ripped off—revealing the horrifying reptilian visage of Mog.
The dragonspawn inside the dead warrior’s skin batted aside the shaft of Ula’s spear and stabbed at her midsection. Ula parried the blow and aimed a counter thrust. Before she could deliver it, though, Mik put his shoulder into Ula’s gut and drove them both across the plaza onto the coral flagstones.
A torpedolike redtip shark flashed harmlessly over their heads. The fish had been aiming for Ula’s exposed back. “Thanks,” she said. Mik nodded.
Mog’s fishy minions circled the plaza, keeping the rest of the treasure hunters busy. Karista put her back against a pillar while Kell stood in front of her, warding off attacks. The brass lord swung his coral lance in short arcs, slashing the flanks of the sharks and razorfish pressing in around them.
Trip played a deadly game of tag with the evil fish. His sea serpent cloak gave him more speed and maneuverability, but the enchanted plaza gave him little room to move. He bobbed and twisted, shooting between the enemy
, and striking them with his twin daggers.
The predators’ teeth had little effect against Shimmer’s bronze armor. Mog had counted on this, though, and directed the bulk of his forces to attack the bronze knight. Enthralled fish surrounded the human-shaped dragon like a whirlwind, battering him from all directions. Shimmer swung his sawtoothed sword at them, killing many, but more fish swarmed in from the sides to replace the dead.
Mog seized the glowing key. He shrieked as the energy of the artifact ripped through him, blowing the remnants of his hideous disguise into streamers of crimson flesh.
Writhing in agony, he swam to the edge of the silver stairs and began to shamble up its wide treads.
“Give it back!” Karista shrieked. She dodged out from behind Shimmer and flung a thin-bladed dagger at the dragonspawn.
The knife pierced Mog’s left hand. He howled, staggered backward, and lost his balance on the edge of the staircase. The key dropped from his hand and tumbled down the stairs.
“Trip! Grab it!” Mik called, as he gutted another dragon- enthralled shark.
The kender dodged through the temple pillars and caught the ancient key on the fly. The gems in the artifact sparked, but it did not bum him. He gazed at it in rapt attention.
“Look out, you fool!” Kell shouted.
Trip ducked just in time to avoid the jaws of a speeding razorfish.
The enraged and bleeding Mog lunged down into the plaza and commanded his fishy allies to destroy the kender. The sharks and razorfish swarmed in on Trip, trying to surround him.
But the sea serpent cloak gave Trip greater speed and maneuverability. He raced away from his pursuers, darting in and out of the terrace’s pillars. Mik, Ula, Shimmer, and Kell tried to cover Trip’s position, but their enemies crowded between them, making it impossible for anyone to help the kender.
“Up the stairs!” Mik said. “The next plaza is above water. The fish can’t touch us there.” He and the others formed a tight group at the stairway’s base, using the pillars on each side to protect their flanks. Karista retrieved her fallen dagger, stained black wijth Mog’s sticky blood, but kept well back of the fray.
Crossroads 04 - The Dragon Isles Page 24
