The Ashen Levels

by C F Welburn

  It was at that moment Ginike came over to Freya, who told him in no uncertain terms to leave or not even the piper’s protection would keep him safe. The man had gone from leper to ladies’ man in the space of one collapsing tree, but was wise enough to know this conquest was a lost cause.

  Balagir used her spleen and the time allotted to put to test the mysterious boundary Igmar had mentioned. It was true. Step out from the shore as he might, his foot hovered and was repelled as like-poled magnets pushed together. He tried several times before becoming aware that he was the object of some fireside mockery, and he did his best to turn his experimentation into idle boredom, kicking a few pebbles oafishly before skulking back. He didn’t like the thought that he was an unwitting prisoner of the north. Once again, the allure of the smoke spoke to him, and he knew that freedom would only be found through stalking it.

  As the sun slid over the eastern water, the piper’s tune peaked in a prickling crescendo, turning all heads as one. It was different from the haunting melancholy that provided each hub with its ethereal accompaniment, distinct also from the glorious flurry of levelling and from that bleak dirge of the breaker’s demise. As the tune soared, a curious thing happened above the fire. A shimmering space opened. A cleft, as though someone had slashed the fabric of air with a knife sharp enough to defy logic.

  “The portal,” Igmar muttered beneath his breath. “And so it begins.”

  Without further explanation, the groups passed through the rift, disappearing one by one as though magicked out of existence. First Ginike’s band of five; men all, armed to the teeth and with a smoke fever in their eyes. Next Finster, amongst his band of six; a mixture of men, jaegir, and idris. He looked more dangerous than in Warinkel, and Balagir did not relish their eventual confrontation. To let Finster succeed in this challenge would grant him more power still; an unsettling thought. The next group, also six, were an odd assortment; some powerful, others hangers-on looking to benefit. They were composed of three men and a jaegir with two stout ‘gnilos for good measure. Their apparent leader was a tall ashen whose white trussed-back hair was at odds with his youthful, unkind face.

  The Good Company were the last to step through, a meagre four, and equally as disparate. The wispy, ragged, skeletal-faced Rych; the bald-headed, one-eared, hook-nosed giant, Igmar; the scowling shadow of Freya; and Balagir, who, despite having upon him several flamboyant items, looked like he had stumbled into the wrong room at a party.

  The fire winked and vanished behind, leaving them alone with no sign of those who had passed before. A bridge spanned a chasm to a gaping mouth in the sand-coloured facade of a crumbling temple. Wordlessly they crossed through into the cold mustiness of ancient rock. Far below, water roared; high above, the unsettling calls of winged creatures pierced the air.

  The chamber opened, illuminated by numerous torches blazing in sconces about the curved walls. Who had lit them and where they had gone were just two of many questions begging to be voiced. Perhaps where the other ashen were and what was their ultimate goal taking precedence. But his queries were stilled by Igmar’s hurried gesture, beckoning them to the centre of the chamber. Before them stood a door, large and ominous, not mollified by the skull that bound the large chains at its centre. Wherever the key lay to unlocking it was surely to be their destination. Two smaller doors stood at either side of the room, smooth without any clear leverage. The object that dominated, however, sat in the centre of the chamber. A curious crystal cube, with dimensions outmeasuring even Igmar, glistened dully in the torchlight.

  As they peered into its depths, Balagir noted four figures standing around a similar object. Only when he moved did he find one of them did likewise, and he knew himself and the view of the chamber as seen from above. He craned, but the ceiling was domed and dim and gave no clue as to where the peering eye lurked. He marvelled as Igmar signalled them to step around the cube. Through another of its four facets could be viewed the same chamber, now with six figures; through the next were Ginike’s group, and in the final, Finster and his band. They were in the same place somehow, yet in another dimension. He paced about to behold himself once more and could have spent some time marvelling the odd device had Igmar’s curse not brought them all around to the far side.

  “Your friend, Finster, and his group are already through the first door. Hurry.” As he looked, he saw they had somehow managed to open one of the side doors and were passing from sight.

  “Spread out,” Freya barked, “there must be a lever.” No one protested, and after a few moments they returned, flummoxed. Balagir scrutinised the cube and counted two additional torches blazing beside the open door. Igmar had seen it too, and together they sped to transfer the flame from the sconce to the blackened torches. A dull click signified success, and with a rumble, the stone slab slid upwards into the rock. A stale air rushed out to engulf them, a breath pent for time beyond reckoning. Aided by the star-wand, they descended the narrow tunnel as swiftly as they dared, motivated by the lead the others had gained.

  The passageway sloped down until they found themselves in an octagonal room. About its walls, in each cranny, loomed towering statues with the menacing heads of fanged insects, brandishing spears and shields. The floor was made up of a hundred small octagons, and on the far side stood an alter supporting an ornate chest. Balagir stepped out and instantly regretted it, as a tile gave way and crashed down into a bottomless void. He would have gone with it, had not Igmar seized his elbow and hauled him back. When his heart had stopped thundering, he thanked the big man with a tremulous nod.

  “There must be a pattern,” Igmar mused, but as much as they looked upon the tiled floor, no clue as to a sequence could be gleaned. Only when he looked back to the door did Balagir see eight metal levers in an alcove besides the entrance. He signalled the others and went to investigate.

  “Careful,” Rych warned shrilly, “it could be a trap.” The bloodstained floor about the levers made his warning as redundant as admonishing fire were hot. Suddenly an idea occurred. He doffed his cloak and tore it into long strips, tying each to one of the eight levers, enabling their activation from a safer distance. Immediately his plan paid off. Upon pulling the first, three long spears jabbed down from the darkness, striking the floor where they would have been standing. Igmar smiled grimly, and Balagir felt pleased he had made a contribution to the group. The treacherous lever reset itself. On the third attempt, the lever activated one of the statues, which turned with a grating movement until its shield caught a beam of sunlight filtering down from a fissure above. The next, however, saw the three deadly spears descend once more and the statue turn back to its original stance. So it was that they must remember the series, starting with the first and testing for the second; once found, linking it to a third, all the while having to restart once they erred. As the statues linked up, they sent the beam of light from one shield to another until the final lever saw the crisscrossing beams complete their circuit. A clear trail of tiles glowed across the floor, highlighting a crooked path to where the altar sat.

  “Who goes?” Freya asked.

  “I will,” Rych said. Igmar seemed reluctant to let the newest member of their party go, but nodded all the same. They hung back, watching nervously as the skull-masked ashen nimbly crossed the puzzle floor. Only once did his foot scrape a neighbouring tile, sending it plummeting into the abyss. Otherwise he made the far side without incident. He ascended the altar and opened the chest.

  “What do you see?” called Igmar.

  “Three stones, each engraved,” he cried back. “Flood; Scorp; Dire ghoul.” He had finished speaking when the distant sound of water reached them.

  Igmar, Freya, and Balagir turned as one towards the entrance.

  “Swiftly Rych! They’ve beaten us to it!” Rych seized the stones, and bounding with something between agility and recklessness made the edge of the pit just as a huge torrent of water came rushing into the chamber. They clung to the wall, desperate not to be swept
back and through the hole where the floor had just been. Balagir’s feet tugged and slipped, and Freya and Rych twice lost their footing and grasped at each other. Igmar remained upright, as a tree defies a river, wading onwards, clawing the roof of the tunnel with blade and nail.

  They emerged, panting and spluttering into the main chamber, leaving the flume-like tunnel behind. Balagir needed not ask what had happened, for when they made it to the cube, he saw for himself. Finster’s group had returned to the main chamber and were already through the second door. Ginike’s group were reduced by two members, standing over the slain carcass of a huge scorp. The final group had all but been demolished. Only two remained: the white-haired ashen and one of the ‘gnilos, both backed up against the altar, slashing at the misty form that assailed them.

  “Give me the stones!” Igmar demanded. He thrust the dire ghoul into the cube where Finster was, where it swirled and swept after them through the door of the second tunnel.

  Running around to the other side, he thrust the water stone into where the group were battling with the ghoul. Balagir watched in fascination as water began to rush into the room, swirling across the tiles, plucking the men and the ghoul alike from the precarious ledge, sucking them down to a dark fate below.

  Wasting no time on remorse, he thrust the scorp stone to where Ginike’s group were. The look of despair on their faces, as from beyond the corpse of one scorp sprang a second, was fascinating. They may have had their differences, but setting this foul creature upon him again was a touch too drastic.

  He saw now how this challenge worked. The piper had pitted them against each other, and the strange temple was merely an arena for the acts of cruelty they must unleash in order to prevail.

  “Fly!” Igmar was yelling. “They mustn’t return with stones.” Adrenalin surged as he sprinted to breach the second door as they had the first.

  The tunnel inside was similar in every way to the last, but the chamber at the bottom was not.

  A wide chasm divided the room in two, and at its far side another altar-mounted chest. A bridge locked by a mechanism rested upwards, and before it stood a set of scales and a pile of mouldering skulls. Beside them imposed a crawling statue of a daerdril, its gator-like snout gaping and one eye hollow.

  “An inscription,” Freya said, gesturing at the base.

  “One skull of nine to be set safe in mine.

  Eight lack such weight as the hand could define.

  Two tries is all, to fight shy lonely fall.”

  “Bah. Give me something I can hack and slash!” growled Igmar in frustration.

  “Confounded conundrums!” Rych yelled, composure crumbling behind that mask of his.

  Now Balagir enjoyed a good riddle, but the thought of their competitors reaching the cube left his thoughts flight and flustered.

  “We must place one of these skulls in the daerdril’s eye,” he interpreted, hesitantly.

  “And we’ve but two attempts at finding which is the heaviest,” finished Freya. “I’ve played such a game before. Count out the skulls.”

  “There be nine,” Igmar said, scratching his bald head.

  “Then be swift. Weigh but six, three in each scale.” Igmar, at a loss, obeyed, and Balagir could only look on, waiting for some fresh horror to come down the passage for them.

  “They weigh the same!” Rych shrieked.

  “Then it must be one of the other three,” Balagir said, seeing it.

  “Quite, weigh just two.” Again, Igmar obliged, and once more they weighed the same. Rych went mad.

  “It hasn’t worked!”

  “It’s the last one. It has to be,” Freya said. They looked at the skull with wild hope, and the skull looked back with austere indifference. No choices remaining, Igmar seized it and thrust it into the socket. After an excruciating stillness, it swivelled to regard them, and the bridge began to lower. Balagir could have embraced Freya then, had not death been breathing down their necks, nor she her glaring self. The bridge was barely down before Rych was across it, seizing the stones and a large key. There was something to be said of his jittery disposition.

  “What are the stones?” Igmar gasped as they sped back to the central chamber.

  “Reflection; Deadly Door; Mothaks.” Comprehension was not requisite to induce foreboding.

  They reached the cube precisely with Finster’s company and watched each other push the three stones into respective dimensions. Many things happened at once. A huge door, identical to the main one, appeared, making it impossible to divine the original; a blur of white shapes, similar to but larger than the glawings he had faced, buzzed down from the heights; and a reflection of their four selves winked out of the air and menacingly approached. The fact that the exact same thing was unfolding to Finster’s party was of little comfort in light of the proceedings. Meanwhile, Ginike, now alone, remained unhindered as he solved the skull riddle.

  As Balagir stepped towards himself, he knew a moment of doubt. How to best oneself? How to outwit a mirrored mind? Fortunately, the mothaks did not differentiate between the two and descended first on his image. As he seized the moment, lunging with the same sword brandished by his foe, he became aware of the others in the room. Two feline-fast shapes, unleashing arrows at each other in a blur; two large bald men, clashing swords and gritting teeth; two white ragged whirls, leaping and spinning scythes like deadly mills.

  Then his sword hit home, and he saw the face his own killer would one day see. His own eyes widening in realisation and mouth going slack. As the dead bundle slumped from his sword and disappeared in a shrivelling of smoke, he knew no respite. The mothak previously disposed now turned on him. On its pale leathery underside, a claw-like jaw opened and clamped across his face. Blind, he lost his sword and sprawled thrashing to the ground. His hand found his pouch and drew forth the star-wand, sending a beam into the mothak’s eyes. It screeched, letting go, flapping away, bouncing off the walls in its haste to escape. Its ugly, dazzled kin followed suit, molested by the glare.

  He turned back, but could no longer tell his company apart. One of the Rychs misstepped, and the other took him apart at the waist. The half figure writhed on the floor, gurgling in shock. Balagir watched, ready to fight. But the fallen Rych smouldered, and the victor shouldered his scythe and gave him a reassuring nod.

  Just then, one of the Freyas took an arrow to the throat. She staggered, spluttering, and her bow clattered to the floor. Rych and Balagir circled the champion until she lowered the bow and said in a voice that could be no clone’s:

  “Get those swords off me, or I’ll feather you both.” They obeyed and proceeded to watch the final epic battle of the Igmars. The two men were sweating and grimacing. The giant had met his match; it was bitter irony it was himself. Unable to stand by as time ebbed, Freya levelled her bow.

  “Igmar!” she called.

  “Here!” one of the shapes cried, and she instantly released her arrow into the other. The pierced Igmar grasped his breast and sagged to the floor, his disbelieving eyes upon them. It was that devastated look of betrayal that saved them from the mirror Igmar bearing down upon them. Freya had frozen, and it was Balagir barging her aside that saved her. Recovering, they ignored as best they could the death throes of their comrade as they paced his deadly likeness. Mighty as Igmar was, he could not defeat all three, and already flagged. The arrow, the scythe, then the sword all had their turn, until the bloodied man dropped and turned to smoke. The other Igmar stared up into the darkness, his black eyes somewhere far away as he slowly vaporised.

  “You were not to know,” Balagir tried, but she pushed him aside and callously continued.

  He had no time to be taken aback by her clinical calm and rushed instead to peer into the active facets.

  Finster had survived the onslaught, though only two remained. Ginike, unheeded however, had made it through the final door. He had obtained the key, though what had become of his stones was unclear. They had no time for grief nor breath, and st
ill faced the choice of the Deadly Door.

  Despite Ginike’s progress, they held back to watch Finster’s group choose the wrong door. It gaped, the frame bearing down with long teeth to devour the jaegir, too bewildered to react. Finster, now alone, opened the true door and vanished.

  The remainders of the Good Company hesitated.

  “Who goes?” Rych wailed. For a time no one spoke, and at last Balagir proffered the charmed bones from his pouch.

  “Ciga? Really?” Freya derided.

  “Lowest opens.”

  “Fine,” Rych agreed grimly.

  “Now would be a good time,” was Freya’s curt affirmation.

  Balagir threw first, a handed eye; then Freya, a sentinel rook. Rych, being the third to throw, could not know his fate was already decided, but the sundered pack confirmed it, and he dipped his head in woe. His face was likely blanched as white as the skull that masked him as he turned wordlessly to face the doors. They could not make out his erratic mumbling as he approached the same portal that had devoured the others. He never stopped to look back, and only once did he dither. Then he turned the key, and nothing happened. He turned, raising his arms in triumph, when the door lurched and ate him noisily.

  Balagir paled at the crunching of bone but would not be waylaid. He retrieved the key—spat out like a piece of gristle—and promptly they were through the real door and descending the tunnel. They spilled out breathlessly into the last room. An expanse of sand lay between them and the final alter; it writhed with some deadly threat.

  Freya let loose several arrows until an ugly snouted worm reared, screeching in fury. It caught her ankle. Balagir hesitated, torn, but it was too late for Freya; she was already being dragged deeper, wrenched down beneath the sand. At the last instant she screamed, but her mouth filled with earth as she disappeared. He snatched the stones and hurried back; the worm, seemingly satisfied with its morsel, let him be.