Trail of Pyres

by L. James Rice

“The Watch is bigger than it looks from the bay.” Eliles had lost count of how many times she’d muttered this or something close to it.

  Eliles and Artus traveled the city every day since scattering Joslin’s ashes into the harbor’s waves, rummaging through buildings as if searching for abandoned supplies, and she guessed they were only two-thirds through the city. They found several axes and fishing spears, and even several casks of whale oil they’d missed before, not that they needed lanterns much these days, but they never caught hint of another soul. A couple folks thought they might’ve seen something while walking the city, but not a one had corroboration from their companion. Whatever they saw may as well have been a bird or a phantom.

  They meandered from a bathhouse empty handed and stared straight across the street at Skywatch. Artus and Jinbin explored it when first they scoured the city, and even now she didn’t want to step into a house of the pantheon.

  Artus strode straight for its single door. “Ready for a step into the night?”

  But she stood rooted. “You searched it before.”

  “Aye, I did, just like we all searched afore, and… Does it frighten you?”

  The notion of being afraid earned the man a glare. “The gods have forsaken their faithful, I’m uncomfortable stepping into a holy place.”

  Artus shifted his weight. “I’ve stepped through that door half a hundred times, I’d wager, both sober and drunk. Ain’t once, ‘cept maybe as a boy, as I felt the gods. Did the Church build it?”

  “No one knows, not for certain.”

  “Even if’n… Would a painting of the night sky give you jitters if painted by a priest? Hells, no. What I see when I walk beneath the stars is an artist’s strokes with a brush I damned well can’t comprehend. It’s a head thumpin’ piece of work, but it ain’t nothin’ more.”

  “There isn’t a single priest who’d agree with you.”

  “Aye, and where did those bastards get us? Come on, let’s go. Won’t take a wick, ‘cept to stare at the stars.”

  I was never one of them, and somehow it still matters. “Fine, then. Show me this painting.”

  Artus opened the door and gestured. “The first time you take a gander at the stars, you shouldn’t have an old warrior blocking yer view.”

  She stepped into pristine night, stars reflecting on a polished black floor. “There isn’t a hint of dust on the floor.”

  The door closed behind her. “You haven’t even looked up yet.”

  She took a deep breath and raised her eyes, and the air in her lungs left her. It was so perfect, it almost felt unreal. It was unreal. Or was it? She’d heard stories of the stargazing oracles heading into the mountains to be closer to the heavens, and how on a clear night, they could see twice as many stars as from Istinjoln. So many sparkles, it was like someone had blown diamond dust into the sky. The Heart of Januel, the Cauldron, the Sickle… the Fire Lion. The star which caused these troubles was no longer an eye, having moved outside the constellation.

  “You were right. It’s spectacular.”

  “I might be a battlefield fist, but my eyes still recognize beauty. More so because of the ugly I’ve seen, I figure.”

  She forced her eyes level, turning. Skywatch was a single open space, difficult to hide anything, except… “Did you find a library?”

  “No, ain’t never seen nothin’ in here ‘cept oracles appearing from the dark.”

  “There should be a library, underground I’d wager. Look for a trapdoor.”

  “Aye, you say so. Could we get some light?”

  Eliles called for a little friend, and a flame arrived with a subdued glow. “Burn brighter, my friend.” The te-xe grew larger, but its radiance did nothing to light the room. “The night doesn’t want to be lit.”

  “Aye, well, makes things harder, but we got time.” He smirked.

  Eliles wandered, eyes pinned to the floor, dragging her foot, in search of a sign of any crack. The floor appeared carved from a single stone, as if the floor were a part of the island itself. There wasn’t a flaw she could see, any suggestion of a hidden entrance, but the stories were clear: High Oracle Meris had a library. A place to store her visions and studies.

  To her left a chime rang, followed in an instant by: “Son of a donkey pissin’ godsdamn, I shoulda been wearin’ my helm.”

  Eliles turned. Artus stood doubled over, clutching his head, and she trotted to him. “What happened?” She put a hand beneath his chin and raised his head; blood trickled down his forehead, streaking cheek above his beard where his hand swiped.

  “Hit my godsdamned head on somethin’.”

  Eliles spun in a circle, eyes plying the dark, but seeing nothing. “Where?”

  Artus reached out and banged on something invisible, and the chime rang again. “Right damned there.”

  She squinted and put her hand out, touching a surface smooth as glass, cool, thick as her thumb, and invisible in the dark. When she leaned in close and ducked, looking at the stars through it, the light shifted a nudge. “Latchu, clear as air.”

  “And harder than my head, godsdamned guaranteed.”

  “Sorry.” With a thought she healed his wound, and he stared at her.

  “Coulda done that a wick ago.” He laughed. “What the hells is it?”

  She ran her hands up and down, finding staggered platforms. “A spiral stair.” She placed her foot on the first invisible step.

  “Woah, girl. We’ve no idea what the hells is up there.”

  She giggled. “Stars!” But she took her steps slow, faith in the next tier being where she expected was her only guide. Nineteen steps, Seven Heavens and Twelve Hells. A sign the devout constructed this sky for the Pantheon. With her eyes level with the final step, she stared out and across the stars, and yet, the stars shown above. Tentative fingers stretched to touch where she guessed a floor might be. Her fingers slid across a surface smooth as glass. “A Latcu floor.”

  She climbed the final steps and put a nervous foot to the surface, and a sonorous bell chimed.

  “That’s a sound I know well, as the oracles walked the stars. I always thought that was horseshit.”

  Eliles gazed through the stars, spying a balding spot on his head. “It’s not that long of a climb.”

  “I weigh more than you girl.”

  “It’s Latcu.”

  “And what if it’s plain ol’ glass?”

  “Well, I don’t think it’d have been here so long.”

  He grunted as he took his first step. “Good point.” He reached the top and his booted feet sounded as gongs compared to her xylophone. “A few more folks and we could write ourselves some music. Still don’t see no one.”

  From here, the eye seemed able to stare a million horizons. “It looks eternal… like descriptions of the Starry Road.”

  “Exceptin’ we’re alive, and nothing’s goddamned endless… leastwise not in a building. Godsdamned mirage.”

  “I’m not so sure.” She walked, the song of her footstep better than any guard dog or other alarm if someone was out there to hear.

  From behind, the sound of Artus’ gongs came slow. “I ain’t ashamed to say, I could piss m’self about now, exceptin’ my bladder’s pinched too damned tight.”

  Eliles giggled. “The mighty warrior.”

  “I could use a fight about now to take my mind off walking on air.”

  “It isn’t so far down.” But he was right. Logic spoke to her being nineteen steps from the floor, but looking down imparted the impression of falling from the height of an eagle’s soar. Her teeth clenched as she spoke. “Don’t look down.”

  “I’ve eyes on the soles of my boots, girl.”

  She couldn’t keep her own advice either as she walked, approaching where the outer wall of Skywatch stood below, but in front of her the universe continued on. She reached out, expecting to find open air, but her fingertip collided with a smooth and invisible wall, striking a soft, chiming ring.

  “Told ya, girl.”<
br />
  “Yes, you did.” The sky was finite after all; her fingers told her so, but it’d take more than a wall to convince her. There was more, she just needed to figure out how to reach it.

  “Can we climb back down? A basement sounds beautiful ‘bout now.”

  “You go ahead, I’m going to wander the Starry Road a while.” The Starry Road. If there was a beyond in these stars, she’d need to walk the correct path, as if reaching for the Seven Heavens. She gazed into the finite eternity, listening to Artus’ gongs beeline to the stair.

  A soft fiery light grew all around, as if the Fire of her tower was emanating light through the walls of Skywatch’s dome, setting the stars amid a distant inferno. Her chin jerked with premonition, directing her eyes straight into the sky. The flames of her tower hid the stars and a massive golden eye stared down at her from the heavens; greater than the eye of the Queen of Shadows, and somehow inspiring less dread.

  Her mouth lolled and her tongue threatened to choke her as it fell back in her throat; what the heavens was this? The being watched her, and she wanted to call out to Artus, but her voice was having nothing to do with being heard. She couldn’t fear, she couldn’t breathe, she wasn’t even certain her heart was beating. The universe’s eye blinked and disappeared in an instant.

  She wobbled and damned near fell backward, catching herself on infinity’s wall. She cleared her throat. “Did you see that?”

  Artus stood by the stair, hesitating to descend. “See what, girl?”

  “You saw nothing at all?”

  “Just the sky.”

  They locked eyes a moment, then she waved him off. “Don’t mind me. We’ll look for the library later. Go ahead and head to The Frog for lunch.”

  “You sure? I hate leavin’ you alone in here.”

  “So long as I’m alone, it isn’t a worry, is it?”

  Artus laughed, but he cut it short as the sound reverberated with unnatural power. “I’ll be back after a meal, and we’ll find that there library.”

  She waited for him to disappear through the door below before walking to the middle of the sky and laying down. She stared straight up. “Come on back, whatever you were.” But the eye played coy, hiding. If it had ever been.

  She twined her fingers behind her head to rest, thinking. If I designed these stars in homage of the Starry Road, the entrance to the beyond would be the Gate of Shooting Stars. Lore found in the Book of Iote spoke of King Priest Esreriun the First dying in battle during the God Wars, his soul finding the Starry Road in a shower of stars, known as the Gate of Shooting Stars. Sol called his soul back to the mortal realms, and he led the Church another fifty years, but with him he brought this tale of the Road. Only trouble was, nowhere at all did the sky reveal such thing.

  Shooting stars. Falling stars. She didn’t even know what triggered the thought. The stairs. She leaped to her feet and trotted to the stairs in a flurry of musical tones and spiraled in descent. As she stepped foot on pitch black stone, she spun beneath the steps, squinting at the floor. She knocked on the darkness; silly to think she’d be able to tell a thing, as if knuckling a melon.

  Closer and closer she looked, until she realized she stared at the wrong thing. Staring wasn’t the answer at all. She ran her hands along the underside of the stairs; every span felt the same, except the fifth, thick as her thumb instead of index finger. She pressed on the underside and pulled, and to her shock it moved. A little. She stretched her hands for a grip and pulled, and stone slid in near silence from in front of her feet, revealing another stair winding down.

  She swallowed hard while staring into darkness; she’d come this far, no reason to stop now. She reached out with her senses, felt nothing alive below, nor nearby. But she’d go no further without her friend. Fire ignited, sitting on her shoulder with a soothing warmth, and its light carried into the shadowy maw, revealing a black stone stair. Whatever force limited light in this place of eternal night didn’t affect this cellar. “What the hells am I scared of?”

  The fire crackled, answering her? She sent the flame ahead and followed.

  The chamber was twenty strides square, and lanterns hung along the walls: They lit with a thought, and she smiled. Rows of books lined the walls, and four desks sat spread for study. It was more functional than luxurious, like most things associated with the Church. “It isn’t the Gate of Shooting Stars, but it’s something.”

  She wandered to a desk where a book lay sprawled open, a blank parchment by its side. She read the heading: Moonglow. “Peculiar.” A recipe for enchanted ink using enchanted amethyst, if she understood right.

  She glanced at the parchment, flipped it over. A hand-written note. No, more like the scrawls of a child learning to write. Deelee, written over and over. And nearby, in the same hand, Meliu repeated. The writing of each name differed at the top of the list. The ink-work was precise in its curves and flow; experienced fingers with a scholar’s skill wrote these names for another to copy.

  “I wasn’t imagining things, Meliu was on the Watch.”

  Slam.

  Eliles turned and ran to the stair, heart palpating, and climbed. She pounded on the stone and screamed. She punched and pushed on stones around the trapdoor and found nothing. She scratched her eyebrow. No way they built this library without a mechanism to get out of here. “Almost no way. Is there?”

  Question number two took several flickers before it sunk in: Did someone close the door, or did it operate on a timing mechanism?

  Pushing her senses revealed no one above or around. If the door sealed on its own, it confirmed there was a way to open it from down here. But where?

  She glanced behind every bookcase, shoved them, moved every book and table she could: Nothing. She wasted her time. Artus would return soon, so she’d might as well dig into the books, discover what wisdom this library held.

  Most of the tomes dealt with the stars, portents, and the oracle of bones, the last things she was interested in these days. Unless they could explain a giant eye staring at her; one other people didn’t see. She doubted her luck in that research. Nor did a one bear a title suggesting it might help solve the riddle of Skywatch’s sky, but with several thousand pages of lore sitting in front of her, the answer could avoid her for longer than she’d remember the question.

  One shelf held a peculiar number of books involving the flora and fauna of southern climates. Someone had an interest in the topic, but she doubted it had been Meris. Another shelf held several books on gemstones and their Elemental properties, much like the entry on Moonglow. Rare was an understatement. The art of the Mystic Lapidary was a school of research unto itself; strange they’d hide so much arcane wisdom here. But what use had she for such things?

  Nothing struck her as obvious. She could spend months of study and get nowhere.

  Footsteps. They came from above, heard in the back of her head, more like a memory of sound as the hearing didn’t come from her ears. Artus.

  Her Fire disappeared, and she closed her eyes, focusing on the energy of its essence, pushing her mind to see what the Fire envisioned. The image was a blurry glow, but it was Artus, froze and staring at the burning ball.

  She spoke, and could hear the crackle of the flame in her head. “Artus.”

  “Son of a bitch, girl, you turned into Fire?”

  She wandered to the stair on her side of the floor, struggling to reconcile seeing two places at once. “There’s a lever, the fifth stair. Pull on it.”

  Her vision of the man was too vague to grasp his expression, but she imagined him squinting as he struggled to piece things together. “So, this’s what my life has broken into, listnin’ to magical balls.”

  The te-xe followed him to the stair. “Fifth stair. The underside will pull out.” He pulled, and the trapdoor slid open, his toes dangling over the edge.

  He wobbled. “Hells girl! I could’ve fallen straight in.”

  She climbed with a grin. “Sorry, I wasn’t thinking.”

  He
looked her in the eye as he pulled his beard. “I take it you found the library.”

  “I did, and it swallowed me.” She giggled.

  His eyes plied the area. “So someone locked you in, or you did it yourself?”

  “My guess is it’s timed, so that’s what we’re going to find out.”

  “Mmm. Anything useful down there?”

  “It’s small, far as Church collections go… Still, plenty of scholarship, but no idea what good any of it will serve.”

  She stared at the sky, its stars having shifted since they entered. It was spectacular, and still more than she understood. “There’s more to these stars than the eye can see.”

  “Ain’t that why the oracles lived here?”

  “How many, exactly?”

  Artus tugged his beard again. “No way to say. I never saw more than two. Some said a dozen, but best I know it were all guesses.”

  “One for each hell… I suspect that guess speaks to the person’s low opinion of Skywatch. A holy nineteen is more apt. Where would twelve sleep, nineteen? Where are their possessions?”

  “Aye, well, living here might notta been so lit—”

  The door to the stair slid closed with a soft click on this side, and the term trapdoor felt more appropriate. “Timed.”

  “Unless some bloke shut it again.”

  “You are a suspicious sort.”

  He scoffed. “I weren’t, not so long ago. I don’t want you down that hole by yer lonesome, hear me?”

  She leaned hand to hip. “You think there’s someone more dangerous than me on this tiny island?”

  “If. If there’s someone wanderin’ about you can’t sense, you tell me who might be more dangerous?”

  “If they’re here, they’re in the stars. The stars are the pathway to the heavens, after all.”

  Artus grunted. “Wanna take another look see?”

  “No, not today. But we’ll be back… set Jinbin and a couple others on them books.”

  “How many folks you think can read on this rock?”

  “Perhaps it’s time everyone learned. How well do you know your letters?”

  He scoffed as he strode for the door. “No godsdamned use for books nor words.”