Curse Of The Dark Wind (Book 6)

by Charles E Yallowitz

  “No fighting!” Nyx demands. She crosses her arms and the towering warrior copies her motions. “I’m in a really bad mood! I won’t kill you, but I’ll beat down every living thing that tries to fight again. Finish this mess, Cunningham, so we can get out of here.”

  “Thanks, Nyx. How long did the geyser giant have the emerald, Sari?” Delvin patiently asks as he holds up his hand for attention.

  “She doesn’t really understand our concept of time,” the gypsy answers, listening to the giant rapidly gurgle. With a stern shush, she silences the panicked creature. “From what I can figure out, she’s had it for over ten years. Though there’s something I don’t understand. She keeps talking about the emerald being dropped to her. I can’t tell if she means it fell out of the Garden of Uli and she found it or it was intentionally given to her by someone.”

  The warrior strokes his chin and grins when he thinks of a way to get an answer. “Ask her if she is the first protector of the emerald. If she says no then find out who came before her and what they were promised when the guardian returns. That makes sense, right?”

  Luke stops playing a lilting tune to mention, “I followed it, but the geyser giant might have issues.”

  “What about-” the titans begin to say. They hold their tongue when the armored behemoth stomps its foot. “We apologize.”

  Hopping onto a tree branch, Sari faces the geyser giant and shakes the tension from her body. She talks in the gurgling language of the naiads and moves her arms for added effect. At first the creatures shakes her wild-haired head and looks on the verge of tears. Sari’s voice hits a high pitch and she wags her finger like she is yelling at a stubborn dog. With an apologetic expression, the former protector bows and slowly answers the question.

  “She comes from a family of geyser giants,” Sari carefully translates. A strong wind shakes the tree and she backs up to use the trunk for extra leverage. “I get it now. Every ten years, one of them would return here to guard the emerald and await the champion. Thirty years ago, she took her turn, but none of her family ever came to relieve her. So she has grown weak from staying in the same region for so long. In order to retain their strength, her kind need to return to their ancestral home for pure water every decade. There were times she tried to hide the emerald and journey away to gather her strength, but the titans stopped her every time. The reward for her family’s service was that they would be granted a new home in the Garden of Uli.”

  “We deserve that home!” bellows the leader of the titans. He spits and pounds his back at Delvin and Luke when they try to talk. “I will not be silent! The titans wish to live in the great garden instead of within its shadow. We are punished by the elements and forced to slumber under the mountain. No more!”

  “Please tell me this fight isn’t over living space,” the brown-haired warrior mutters under his breath. He meets Luke’s gaze and they nod to each other. “Would both parties be open to living in the Garden of Uli together? By both parties I mean you and the geyser giant.”

  “We refuse to live with a family of wanderers!” the titan roars, the others cheering in agreement. “The space would be too little for both of us.”

  “I think she’s the last of her family,” Sari mentions as a few tears roll down her cheeks. Climbing around the tree, she faces the titans and awkwardly curtsies. “She’s all alone and would take up only a small corner of the Garden. You might never know she’s there if this place is as big as I imagine.”

  The titans shift their attention between the three adventurers and the geyser giant who is staring at her steaming feet. A sigh of relief rumbles through the villagers when the magical warrior vanishes and Nyx takes a seat on the snow-covered stump. The largest titan signs to the others and gets a mess of responses that causes him to scowl, his three eyes scrunching into his brow. With a booming slap to his back, the leader quiets his people and approaches the solitary pine.

  “We agree to your terms and ask what we must do to make sure we have a place among the flying garden,” the titan politely says. Kneeling and crossing his arm over his shoulder, the giant meets Delvin’s calm gaze. “Please let us thank you by aiding you in your travels.”

  “Fizzle and I are getting really tired,” Luke whispers into his friend’s ear.

  “That fact has crossed my mind,” the brown-haired warrior replies. He waves for Timoran, Fizzle, and Nyx to come to the tree before turning back to the titans. “I assume you know where we can find the entrance to the Garden of Uli. All we know is that it has to do with the Widowhorn. With your help, we can get there quickly and without having to fight the horned spiders. Can you carry us?”

  Without hesitation, the titan’s leader grabs Delvin and places the human on his bald head. “We will bring you as close to the pillars as we can. Titans are too large to use your paths, but we can climb to the cliff you desire.”

  Several of the giants take the other adventurers, but Sari refuses and tries to talk the geyser giant into coming. The thin creature shakes her head and disperses into a cloud of steam that flows across the ground. With a final look at the melting snow and thickening fog, Sari lets a titan place her on its shoulder. The last thing she sees is the geyser giant’s head peek out from behind a tree stump and dart back into the steam.

  13

  The six pillars sit upon the windless cliff and cast their shadows against the side of the Widowhorn. Each of the smooth columns is a different color and they hum whenever approached, but none of the champions have risked touching them. Vivid memories of the entrance to the Island of Pallice plays through most of their minds, forcing the adventurers to be cautious. A path of water-stained cobblestones runs between the strange ruins and ends at the first wooden step of a stairway that no longer exists. Floating no more than half a mile ahead of the cliff is a thick cluster of white clouds that shift and swirl, but never move away from the mountain. There is a sense of anxiety rippling through the breeze as if a calamity is waiting to be set free.

  “Can I talk to you?” Sari asks Delvin in a low voice. She leads him to the far side of the cliff, glancing over at where Nyx and Timoran are arguing over the Compass Key. “Luke and Fizzle are sleeping and the others are busy figuring this out. I think this is the only time we have to talk about what happened in Fyric.”

  “I’m not sure I follow you,” the warrior replies. He almost leans on a pillar, but shifts his weight to gracelessly fall to the ground. “That was close. These entrance puzzles are probably designed to be deadly.”

  “Whatever. I need to talk to you about Nyx and her being a channeler,” Sari hisses. Making a few quick motions with her hands, she casts a silence bubble over them to prevent Timoran from overhearing their conversation. “I can’t tell how she’s taking it. She hasn’t brought it up and I don’t know if I should. I’ve really wondering about it too because it sounds like something that could change a lot about her and our adventures. Did she mention anything while you two were alone in Fyric?”

  The warrior peers at the caster to see fire running along her arms, their shimmering causing him to lose focus for a few seconds. “Come to think of it, she never mentioned it. We were more concerned with Stephen and what he wants to do to her. I’m sure she’s fine. Nyx would have said something to one of us if she was upset.”

  The gypsy rolls her sparkling eyes and points to where Luke is sleeping in a tight cocoon of blankets. The half-elf is snoring softly and his skin is a sickly pale with subtle black veins from the Dark Wind. With all of his ranting about courage and not giving up, he has been unable to hide the pain and weakness that is wracking his body. The disease has even begun to drain Fizzle’s energy, the drite barely able to cast anything more powerful than basic wind magic and his usual invisibility. The tiny dragon is curled against the half-elf’s chest, his head poking out of the blankets.

  “Nyxie wouldn’t want us to think of anything other than saving Luke. I’m betting she felt guilty that we worried about the Stephen issue,” Sari explai
ns, wiping a few icy tears from her cheeks. “I can’t imagine what it must be like to discover you’re not what you always thought you were. Then you’re told that one of your mentors might have known all along. Hearing it from a monster like Stephen makes it even worse. Nyxie’s entire world was turned upside down and we haven’t tried to talk to her about it.”

  “You ever consider that she’s okay with it?” Delvin calmly asks. He pats Sari on the head when she opens her mouth to argue. “Nyx has always known that she’s special, so a part of her might have always been prepared for something like this. The real issues are Isaiah keeping secrets and that she might be distantly related to Trinity. Both of those revelations need to be handled by confronting the two of them. One at a time and with us by her side of course.”

  Sari gently grabs the warrior by the ear and pulls his head close to her mouth. “If you want to win her over then show some concern. It doesn’t matter if part of her knows or if a confrontation is the only way to fix things. Be a real man and talk to her.”

  “Time and place, Sari. I’ll talk to her once Luke is cured and the Garden is saved. We’ll probably have to stay here for a few months like with your temple. What I’m saying is that there’s no rush.”

  “No rush for what?” Luke asks, startling his friends. He grins from within his wrappings, but the expression is broken by a yawn. “Is something wrong with Nyx?”

  “That’s right. Nobody told you she’s a channeler,” Delvin replies while helping the half-elf out of the blankets. “Stephen told her when we encountered him outside Fyric. He said Trinity is one too and Isaiah might have known this whole time. Sari is concerned that Nyx hasn’t said anything about it and I never tried to broach the subject.”

  “Fizzle smell power before, but not sure,” the drite admits as he stretches his wings. He hops to the ground and shiver, a few dead scales falling off his tail. “Fizzle sorry he stay quiet. It not easy to tell. Change magic and view of Nyx. Should we talk now?”

  “By the gods, don’t talk to her now!” Luke exclaims, his voice echoing off the mountain. He lowers his voice, assuming that Sari and Delvin’s looks of dread are because they do not want to attract the horned spiders. “We’re going to need Nyx in the Garden, so bringing up something like this is a mistake. I don’t want to sound like a jerk, but this can wait until she has the time to absorb everything.”

  Delvin swallows the lump in his throat and leans over to Sari. “He’s not under your silence spell, is he?”

  “Nope.”

  They feel the heat from the fire surrounding Nyx before she finishes storming across the cliff. She opens her mouth to shout, but is stopped when a blast of cold water strikes her from the side and douses the flames. Luke rushes to wrap the blanket around the shivering caster while Sari stays on guard. The gypsy sighs and walks over to kiss Nyx on the lips, delivering a spell that dries her off and warms her body.

  “I’m never sure what to say after you do that,” Luke awkwardly mutters. “It’s my girlfriend kissing my big sister, which . . . my head hurts.”

  “Just imagine that it’s Kira instead of Nyx and you’ll be like every other man on Windemere,” Sari replies with a playful smirk. She hugs the caster and stops her from moving her arms. “Before you say anything, we were only discussing how to bring up the subject of you being a channeler. Delvin and Luke are right that this isn’t the time, but we need to talk about it later. Took the wind out of your sails, huh?”

  “Expertly,” Nyx says, hugging the gypsy back and smiling. “Give me time to think about it on my own. I’ll come to someone when I’m ready. For now, we focus on Luke and the living curse. After all, my problem isn’t life-threatening.”

  “Good point,” Sari agrees, noticing that the half-elf is still hugging her tightly. She tries to pull away, but Nyx’s hold is impossible to break. “Are you considering squeezing me until I’m gasping for air?”

  “Maybe.”

  “Isn’t this a bad time for childish revenge?”

  With a final squeeze, Nyx lets go of her friend and fixes her shirt collar, the fireball clasp having come undone. Sari is the only one who can see a few tears evaporating from the corners of the caster’s eyes. A subtle wag of her finger is all Nyx needs to tell her friend to keep her inner turmoil a secret.

  “We believe we have figured out the entrance. At least the basic concept,” Timoran declares as he approaches. He holds out the Compass Key and turns it so that each gem is pointing to its corresponding pillar. “As we all noticed, the pillars and the gems match in terms of color and placement. I think the pearl represents the road since the cobblestones would have been the same color when they were first laid down. The real challenge of the puzzle is to figure out how to activate the entrance. We attempted to touch the yellow pillar by hand and with the Compass Key, but nothing happened.”

  “That was risky,” Delvin says, approaching the nearest structure. Nothing happens when he touches the black stone even when he gently knocks on it. “Maybe a champion can only activate their associated pillar and you picked the wrong one. We really don’t know who’s connected to the amber, the diamond, or the obsidian.”

  “You forgot the ruby,” Luke states. He meets Nyx’s blank gaze and pats her on the cheek. “I didn’t know if we wanted to go for the obvious.”

  “So everyone choose your pillar or the one you think is yours,” the caster orders as she heads for the red column. “Delvin and Timoran can take guesses while the rest of us wait. I think we have to touch them at the same time.”

  Luke and Sari hurry to their associated pillars while Timoran and Delvin look at the three unclaimed ones. Running his hand over the Compass Key, the barbarian feels a warmth flow from the polished obsidian. Remembering the same sensation from when he touched the gem in Gaia, he steps in front of the black column. He turns to offer the relic to Delvin, but the brown-haired warrior is already walking to the distant yellow pillar. Timoran shrugs and focuses on his area, a needle of doubt blossoming in his brain.

  “On the count of three!” Nyx yells, putting her head an inch away from the stone. “One! Two! Three!”

  Everyone touches their pillar and waits for something to happen, but all they get is a minute of awkward silence. Averting his eyes, Timoran touches the Compass Key to the black stone, but the column fails to react. He breathes a sigh of relief and faces the others who are meeting near the wooden step at the edge of the cliff. Fizzle flits from one pillar to the other, the drite too cautious to touch them.

  “I had a feeling that wouldn’t work,” Delvin claims, gesturing at the unclaimed white pillar. “We don’t have all the champions here. If it required each of us hitting the pillars at the same time, we’d never get in. Yet the Compass Key sent us here, so there has to be another way. Probably in a specific order.”

  Nyx stretches her back and takes a seat on the rough step. “I thought the same thing, but Timoran had a good argument against it.”

  “I pointed out that our enemies could enter the Garden by trying every combination. It wouldn’t even take a lifetime to figure out,” the barbarian explains while scanning the cliff for a clue. He snaps his fingers and laughs when an idea occurs to him. “The answer at the Island of Pallice involved the Compass Key. It is safe to assume that this entrance requires the champions to have it as well. Without this artifact, our enemies would be stopped even if they knew the order. At least to get in through the front door since we have been told that there are other, more lethal paths.”

  “There was also the threat of death over our heads the last time, which means that will repeat itself,” Luke casually mentions. His eyes fall on the wooden step and he kneels next to Nyx. “Strange how this untreated wood is still in one piece. Get up for a bit, Nyx. I might not be in the best shape for this, so somebody needs to hold my legs.”

  Timoran grabs Luke by the ankles as the half-elf flips over the step. The dizzying height stirs the groggy griffin spirit and he fights the urge to kick himself fre
e of his friend’s grasp. Straining his back and neck, the half-elf peers at the underside of the step. He can barely see a message that is etched into the wood and painted a glistening green. Unable to read the ancient language, he memorizes it and pushes himself back to the cliff. Without a word, he reaches into Sari’s skirts and draws a dagger, grinning at her yelp of surprise. Finding a soft piece of earth, he carefully writes the message in the dirt while the others gather around him.

  “This was written on the step, but I can’t read it,” he admits as he hands the dagger back to Sari.

  “The first line is in original Orcish and the second line is in old Dwarven,” Nyx says. She gets on her hands and knees to take a closer look, her tongue running along her lips. “There’s supposed to be a keyhole somewhere around here, which will activate the pillars. Then we must breathe life into them by the order of those who accepted the path. It’s not a perfect translation.”

  “First we have to find the keyhole,” Delvin says, clapping his hands and eyeing the mountain. “I’m going to start over there.”

  The champions spread out to search the cliff while Fizzle watches from above. Thinking hard about the keyhole, the drite scratches his head with his tail. From his high vantage point, he can see very few places for such a thing to be hidden. The tops of the pillars are flawlessly smooth and none of the stones on the ground stand out. His eyes shimmer as he searches for illusions, but none of the scenery changes. Nearly an hour passes before Fizzle hears the others quit and return to the middle of the cliff. He is about to join them when his attention is drawn to the strange movements of the clouds. While not within reach, they have drifted surprisingly close to the cliff and ignore the push of the high winds.