Lessek_s Key e-2

by Rob Scott

  ‘Rutting whores!’ the old man shouted. ‘What was that?’

  ‘Get up, Gilmour,’ Steven hissed, ‘on your feet, now!’

  Harren’s empty eye sockets glowed amber for a moment, then faded to black. ‘Hello Fantus, so good to see you again,’ Nerak said through his skeletal mouthpiece. ‘I am so very glad you came all this way for nothing. Was it a hard journey?’ Harren’s jawbone hung open as the dark prince laughed. ‘It’s been gone for a long, long time, Fantus, and you’ll never find it. Eldarn itself wards the spell table for me, Eldarn and Eldarn’s most ruthless gatekeepers. Forget the spell table, Fantus. It’s mine. It has always been mine.’

  Gilmour’s gaze fell to the floor; he couldn’t summon the courage to look at Harren’s ruined body, now Nerak’s prisoner.

  Nerak was enjoying the moment immensely. He turned on Mark Jenkins. ‘And you, my prince, you have everything figured out yet? If you believe you do, you’re wrong. Keep at it, though, because our day is coming.’

  Grimacing, Mark stepped towards the skeleton, his battle-axe drawn and raised to strike. ‘Stop calling me that.’

  ‘My prince? Oh, that? Enjoy it while you can. I have a special place for you in the Fold. It’s dark in there, Mark. I hope you’re not afraid of the dark.’

  With a cry, Mark attacked the skeleton, hacking away one arm. Nerak grabbed him by the throat with Harren’s remaining hand; its grip was impossibly strong, and Mark tugged hard at one bony finger until it snapped.

  His friends were still frozen in shock, but finally Rodler moved, swinging his fist like a cudgel to break through the bones of Harren’ forearm. As they snapped, Nerak’s vice-like grip was released and the remaining fingers fell away. They disintegrated to dust when Mark, in disgust, cast them against the chamber wall.

  Armless, Harren turned back to Steven. ‘Give me the key, and you can go home, you and Hannah. I regret that I can’t let Mark Jenkins go with you, for he and I have other plans, don’t we, Mark?’

  Mark rubbed feeling back into his throat and growled, ‘Any day, sister. I’m right here.’ He threw the axe and it crashed through Harren’s ribcage and clattered on the floor behind him. Nerak was unfazed.

  ‘The key, Steven. It is up to you.’ With that, what was left of Harren’s skeleton collapsed in a dusty pile.

  ‘Cover your wrists!’ Mark yelled. ‘Jesus Christ, cover your wrists!’ He folded his hands under his armpits, not really believing that would keep the dark prince from taking him.

  ‘Don’t worry,’ Steven said, ‘he can’t attack us.’

  ‘How do you know?’ Garec asked, staring at the backs of his wrists, waiting for the skin to discolour.

  ‘Because he’s not really here,’ Steven said. ‘Did you see the eyes glow yellow? He’s not here. He may not even be in Gorsk, never mind the palace. That was a phone call.’

  ‘A what?’ Rodler asked, his hands shaking and sweat streaming from his face.

  ‘We’re safe.’ Steven wrapped an arm around Gilmour’s shoulders, trying to comfort the weary old man.

  ‘Safe? I can’t say I feel safe.’ He looked at Mark, who nodded silent thanks. Rodler punched him softly in the upper arm, and both men smiled, grateful to be alive.

  The first drops to strike the floor went unnoticed, then Garec said, ‘What is that? Rain?’

  Mark shook his head. ‘Nah. It’s too cold for rain.’

  ‘Maybe it’s snow, melting on the roof. Those torches are throwing off a little heat now.’

  Rodler reached out and caught a droplet with a celebratory cry. ‘Hah, got one!’

  Mark wheeled on him. ‘Wipe it off! Wipe it off now!’

  ‘What? What is it?’

  ‘It’s acid,’ he said, ‘it’s eating through the roof. We have to get out of here, now.’

  Rodler yelped as the acid bubbled its way through the skin on his palm. Rubbing his hand against his cloak, he looked to the others for some explanation, his eyes wide with terror.

  ‘The Windscroll,’ Steven said, ‘Gilmour, where is the third Windscroll? We have to get it, fast.’

  ‘I- I don’t… I’m not sure I know which-’

  ‘Gilmour!’ Steven swatted the old man again with the hickory staff and another bolt of fire lanced through his body.

  ‘Gods rut!’ Gilmour bellowed, ‘I wish you wouldn’t do that!’

  ‘Then pay attention. We need the third Windscroll, now, before this rain kills us all. Go!’

  Finally fully conscious again, Gilmour hustled across the spell chamber and disappeared down a short flight of stairs into an adjacent room: Lessek’s scroll library. He watched as more droplets smoked their way through the ancient wood and slate of the tower ceiling.

  ‘It’s those clouds,’ Mark said redundantly.

  ‘The clouds from Orindale,’ Garec agreed. ‘Gita and her men described them: acid in a living cloud. What kind of twisted animal comes up with something like that?’

  A low hissing sound filled the chamber as wood and stone disintegrated above them: the entire structure was gradually being eaten away. Soon they would not need to dodge periodic drips; before long the deadly fluid would rain down on them in torrents.

  A shingle gave way and a thin stream of deadly acid began running into the spell chamber, a harbinger of what was coming. ‘Hurry up, Gilmour,’ Steven shouted, ‘things are getting bad out here.’

  ‘I think I have it – ah!’

  ‘Are you all right?’

  ‘Yes, I’m fine. A drop fell on the back of my neck – it burns, but I’m all right for now.’ Gilmour appeared in the doorway, his feet skidding on the stone as he tried to avoid charging headlong through the acid stream pouring through the ceiling. He had several scrolls tucked under one arm. ‘Let’s go.’

  As they started down the spiral staircase, the ceiling of the Larion spell chamber gave way with a crash and what was left of poor Harren’s bones dissolved in the flooded room. The trickle of almost living liquid grew moment-by-moment into a steady stream, running down the stairs behind the fleeing party.

  Rodler, disconcerted at the size of the burning wound caused by just one droplet of the noxious fluid, shouted, ‘We have to hurry, boys. It’s coming down behind us!’

  Steven looked back as well. ‘Holy shit, look at that! Everybody, keep to your feet – we can’t fall. If we fall, we’re dead. Don’t think about anything but quick feet and keeping your balance. Run, now, move it!’ As they pounded down the worn staircase, the river of acid gained ground on them with every step.

  ‘Keep your feet! Keep your feet! Move it! Move it! Move it!’ Steven chanted in rhythm to encourage them.

  Rodler hesitated long enough to check back again, and cursed himself for doing so: the acid was right on his heels, just five steps back, then four. It was coming too fast, and he was last in line. How in the name of the gods of the Northern Forest did he end up last in line?

  ‘You have to run, boys. Jump down the gods-rutting stairs if you have to – we’re losing this race,’ he screamed.

  They picked up the pace, trying to avoid slipping, loudly cursing the Larion Senators for building such a tall tower with such smoothly polished stone steps. One tumble, one mistake, and they would all be bathed in deadly acid.

  Three steps back, then two. Rodler, realising the poisonous stream was hugging the insides of the steps, was running on the outside of the spiral staircase. That makes it faster, he thought. He could hear the hissing, like ten thousand angry snakes, coming up behind him, eating away at the very foundations of the tower. When he looked down again, the acid was keeping pace with him, running on the inside of the same steps he traversed on the outside. It was too late; he would be the first to step in it. He wondered how much protection his boots would actually provide and was horribly afraid of the answer: not much.

  Finally he heard Garec burst through the doorway, and a moment later he too was outside and the acid river was flowing past them, down the remaining stairs to the tower’s b
asement. Gasping, he collapsed on the stone walkway. ‘That was too close, my friends. I was just on my way to work when I ran into you. Never saw you – that was a rutting good spell you cast, Steven. I never saw you… and I wish with all my heart I had never stumbled into you…’

  Beside him, sprawled out on the stone bridge, Mark began to laugh. ‘That certainly wasn’t your day, was it?’

  The others joined in. Garec said in an effeminate voice, ‘So dearheart, how was work today?’ Even Gilmour roared at this, his thin frame doubled over. They had lost. He had given up; the stress was too much for him to bear. He laughed inanely until he couldn’t catch his breath, then lay down beside Mark, the cold of the nearly frozen stone chilling the acid burn on the back of his neck.

  ‘Wait,’ Steven said, ‘wait!’

  ‘Catch your breath first, Steven,’ Mark said. ‘We’re still trying to get over the last one.’

  ‘No, wait. It’s no joke. Look up there.’ He pointed towards the top of the north tower where grey-black clouds were dissolving much of the tower’s uppermost level in their unholy acid bath. Even the outer layers of stone had grown discoloured and it was only a matter of time before the peak collapsed.

  What alarmed Steven was not that the Larion spell chamber and scroll library had been destroyed, but that one of the clouds had broken away from its partner and was dropping down on them. He rolled to his feet and screamed, ‘Move!’

  He raced to the doorway and tugged on the latch. Nothing happened – he couldn’t budge it. It must be locked from the inside. The cloud fell towards them, an acrid bath of death descending from heaven like an Old Testament nightmare. He grasped the latch and tugged, hoping to break the ancient clasp with muscles and the sheer strength of his will, but it was as solid as a mountain.

  He peered over the side of the causeway and wondered if they would survive the jump, if perhaps there would be water, a deep river or maybe a lake far below. But his hopes were dashed: all he could see were rocks, trees and forbidding cold ground. It was too far to jump; it would kill them. He reached for the staff; he had five seconds to think of something to save them – but nothing came to mind. He was too terrified. He held the staff over his head, praying it might act of its own volition, generating some miracle to keep them safe.

  Then Gilmour was beside him, throwing his hands up to the door and chanting. It opened. Garec and Rodler dived past him and down the few stairs to the corridor below, then Mark grabbed his roommate by the collar and heaved him through the archway to tumble down the unforgiving steps. Steven was glad there were only five or six of them as the two friends landed painfully on the hallway floor. Gilmour dived for the protection of the corridor and shouted; his spell caused the door to slam shut and the hollow thud resonated out into the palace.

  In the instant before the door closed, Steven saw the acid cloud strike the causeway with a vengeance, raining noxious fluid and for ever cutting off access to the north tower. The stone bridge dissolved like a paraffin taper.

  Rodler looked around at the collected members of their company. ‘I need to find a fountain. My hand is burning,’ he said, matter-offactly.

  ‘I do as well.’ Gilmour regained his feet with a groan. ‘I took a thick drop on the back of my neck. I think I’ll feel it boring in there for the next Twinmoon. Come on, Rodler, there’s one down the hall. The aqueduct is a long way from those clouds, so the water should still be clean.’

  ‘I’ll come with you,’ Mark said. ‘I need something to drink.’

  ‘I’m afraid it’s just water, Mark.’

  ‘Yes, but with Nerak out and about somewhere and those clouds slowly eating this place as a snack, I figure we’ve plenty of time to raid your wine cellar.’ He started down the hall. ‘Don’t forget your scrolls.’

  Gilmour gathered up the parchment rolls and turned to follow Rodler and Mark down the corridor to a small fountain, a delicate trickle splashing into a carved stone basin.

  Rodler reached the fountain first, but he gestured for Mark to go ahead of him and drink his fill.

  ‘Don’t be silly. You just saved my life, and for your efforts you were burned – you’ve got the honours. ’ Mark gave a bow, and ushered the young man forward to wash his injured hand.

  ‘All right,’ Rodler said as the water washed over his wound, ‘thanks Mark. I appreciate it.’

  ‘My pleasure-’

  The almor struck with such ferocity that Mark was knocked off his feet and into the opposite wall. The demon took Rodler Varn of Capehill and he was dead in an instant, as dead as Bridget Kenyon there in the deep end of the Air Force Academy pool -

  Mark heard Gilmour shout from somewhere behind him, and felt the Larion sorcerer’s magic blast by him like a mortar round to slam into the creature and rip the fountain out of the wall. Flailing in the almor’s grip, one of Rodler’s hands came forward; Mark seized it and began to pull – but instead of tugging the smuggler free, Mark felt his own life siphoning away. Rodler’s fingers collapsed and shrank to bony twigs, as unnervingly brittle as Harren’s when clasped about his neck.

  Repulsed, Mark finally gave up, released Rodler and watched as the milky creature retreated back into the palace wall. It all happened in an instant; there had been nothing anyone could do. Falling to his knees in a puddle beside the ruined fountain, Mark Jenkins began to cry.

  Steven stared in shocked disbelief for several moments before he rose to his feet, peeled off his jacket and ran down the hall towards his friend. By the time he reached Mark, he was in a rage, his eyes dancing with anger and the hickory staff glowing red.

  ‘No!’ he roared, raising the staff. ‘No! No! No! You did not just do that! You did not just kill him!’ Steven struck the wall above the broken fountain and the foundations of Sandcliff Palace seemed to quiver.

  An explosion knocked the others off their feet and tumbled Mark from his knees into a foetal position, looking so vulnerable that Steven reared back and struck the wall once again. When the smoke and dust finally cleared, a hole big enough to accommodate the small party comfortably had been opened in the blocks between the corridor and an apparently abandoned chamber beyond. Running down through the masonry was a makeshift tube – broken now beyond repair – that Steven guessed was connected somehow to the palace’s central aqueduct. The fountains weren’t magic; it was a simple system of pressure and abundant supply that kept the water flowing at Sandcliff. Jabbing the hickory staff into the cracked ends of the ceramic pipe, he released a devastating blast of destructive energy that tore through the palace.

  Hoping he had done enough to frighten the almor away, or at least stun it, Steven kneeled down beside Mark. ‘Are you all right?’

  Mark choked. ‘I hate it here, Steven; I really do. Clouds of living acid, water demons – how are we supposed to fight?’

  Steven had no answer. He stared at the shattered fountain lying on the stone floor beside the leathery sack that had been Rodler Varn of Capehill.

  ‘That was supposed to be me,’ Mark went on through his tears. ‘He wanted me to drink first. That was supposed to be me. I insisted he go first. Can you fucking stand that?’

  Steven was already on his feet. Stepping over the body, he reached out with two fingers and wiped them gently around the spout that had carried water through the tiny sculpture and into the marble bowl. Rubbing his fingers together, he said, ‘Sonofabitch. Look at that.’

  Gilmour was by his side, still shaking, and thrilled and frightened at the crushing blast he had called up to tear the fountain from the wall; he suspected it was his magic that caused the almor to scurry back into the dark recesses of the Sandcliff cistern. ‘What is it, Steven?’ he asked.

  ‘You said there was an aqueduct. Where?’ He was so intense now, and Gilmour could feel the power of the hickory staff surrounding him, charging the stale air of the old hallway.

  ‘It comes in through the east wall, below the main hall, turns a wheel downstairs and dumps into various lines that feed the fountain
s throughout the keep.’ He stepped away a little, nervous that the staff might touch him and inadvertently stop his heart, or blow a hole in his chest – he was still smarting from the firebolts Steven had used to shock him back to consciousness.

  ‘Garec, take Mark downstairs. Get to the lowest level you can reach without getting wet, or being near any water supply – I mean it. I don’t want you in sight of any water at all.’

  Garec helped Mark to his feet and as they made their way down the corridor, Steven called after them, ‘Keep your heads down, and wait for us to come get you.’

  ‘Right,’ Garec said, ‘I understand. It’s going to be bad.’

  Gilmour asked, ‘What are you going to do?’

  ‘The clouds are eating this place stone by stone, and they won’t stop until they have consumed us, right down to socks and boots. There is a demon in the water supply. I’m not going to have any of it, Gilmour. I think I know how to deal with both of them at once, but I need to know if we can get to a place on the aqueduct – without those clouds detecting us – where I might climb up and access the water supply.’

  ‘Water won’t do anything to those clouds, Steven,’ Gilmour warned.

  ‘Don’t worry about that: can we get there without those clouds noticing?’

  Gilmour’s face was layered in wrinkles as he concentrated. Finally he said, ‘Yes, I think we can.’ Then almost boyishly, he added, ‘Gods rut it, but Steven, I can get you there. Let’s go.’ He led the way towards the centre of the keep.

  Steven ran through the forest and up the sharp incline beside Sandcliff Palace. He kept his head low, hoping the clouds gnawing the north wing of the Larion keep down to its bones would ignore Gilmour and him as they moved towards the top of the aqueduct. The woods were thick enough to mask their movements, but they did little to diffuse the hissing as the acid melted the ancient stone.

  Arriving at the aqueduct, Steven and Gilmour huddled amongst the trees that grew along the base of the stone waterway. The Larion aqueduct was enormous, a marvel of engineering and architecture, the gigantic mortared stone archways supporting a veritable river; they climbed the hillside to the top of the mountain. Steven had no doubt that Larion Senators had spent time in Italy during the Renaissance.