Warmed, Cage then looked up and found the orb was a pinprick high up in the darkness, waiting for him patiently. There is no other alternative to backtrack.
“Hot food will do some good.” He decided and used the fire to cook a hearty vegetable stew and for desert he munched on a power bar made of oats, honey, molasses and dry fruit.
Curiously he also checked for anything important around the dead and found nothing but ancient bones and no more messages could be spotted to help out.
Afterwards he returned to the cheery fire and finished eating. Fire in front, Cage leaned against the wall for a night to sleep. No creature would approach, if there were more that weren’t bound to water. Aching muscles from holding back called for sleep and recovery. The wish was granted.
First thing after rising from slumber Cage did a series of stretches and found his wound mostly healed, but a nasty reminder stayed there. He inspected the entire area, staying away from the water that lurked more danger. Nothing turned up or gained any closer interest. The sheer wall was slick with moisture and would be difficult at best to climb. The only available solution was to use the ascending stairs.
The whisper of wind beneath the numbing roar of the waterfall spoke of stronger air currents up the hole so it was decided to finally break out the “Lantern.” He said and removed an almost identical oil lantern he remembered from museums and what one would find at old farms back on Earth. Cage checked the container beneath and found it full, the wick saturated and ready to burn. One lit twig from the dying embers of the well deserved fire sparked the wick’s fabric to flame. Cage quickly twisted down the glass guard and altered the shutter to make it an effective lantern. He couldn’t find a use for the debris so he let it lay. It was too cold and wet down here to do any harm.
Taking one cautious step at a time was difficult, but necessary. By the three sets of remains, the fall was from much higher but best not to take chances on the unknown steps. It could have been magically slammed and a dozen feet was more than ample to cause such injuries.
The exercise was great, making his legs burn with exertion. It was almost like climbing up to a Tibetan temple, starting at the base of a mountain, but Cage found out quick that these steps were much… much higher. An hour later he judged his progress and knew to reach where the light had shot up would take days to reach, making the shaft more than six miles tall, well taller than Mount Everest on Earth or the Etheriuum Cap of the Fire Mountains, home of Rex Nattan.
But after a mile of climbing, Cage heard the change in the air and paused at a corner to find the tunnel opened to an enormous cavern and felt wind whipping his robe in seemingly random directions. As far as the lantern’s light reached, even focused, it could not pierce the shroud far enough to the right of the cavern and barely reached the opposite wall of the cave. Judging by the power whipping around he decided that the first underground canyon’s currents came all the way here somehow. His mind conjured flying from the canyon here, but such a path would have been too suicidal, especially without the ability to see. With all the stones, even sound would be impossible to navigate. Bats certainly wouldn’t make it, if they lived around here that is.
Even Cage’s fierce dedication to training and exercise had limits. Not even half way up, further than most would dream in the same position, his burning legs needed a break. A gouge in the edge of the stone gained his attention to the otherwise uniform stairs. Finding this step as good as any to break, he approached on hands and knees, aware the marks weren’t natural and was the likeliest place one of the dragons were thrown from.
Cage was proven right as he found a broken dragon’s tooth lodged in the stone at the corner where one had bitten down and tried desperately to climb back up. But then Cage felt wind on the back of his neck pick up before a gust shot his chest to the ground. Only a sure grip on a gouge left by the tooth marks kept him from being sucked out. A strong push back offered safety and as soon as he was out of the shaft, the force dwindled.
“Never felt such a powerful downburst before.” He said to himself and backed all the way to the wall. “No wonder the dragon couldn’t pull himself back in. That gust would have surely sent it careening down to the ground without a chance to escape. Just like my fight with the Tiaxm, at too much speed even the safe landing wards wouldn’t work. Without magic to heal like Granny and Jormon did for me after I was a broken mess.” He murmured considering. “No flyer could resist that!”
While resting up there became four other visible and ancient signs of struggles on the opposite cave wall, barely visible to even a trained eye to always find the differences in things. They were all higher up on the opposite wall, but the terror of impotence against a mighty primal force of nature showed no mercy. Ripped from the slick stone wall showed signs of useless struggle, but what could make anyone fly in such windy conditions? Cage asked himself while munching on a fat orange carrot.
A day and a half later the bitter wind grew stronger and stronger. Each step was one less than the next to reach the top. Still there was no sign of a ceiling, but there was one sign, about three quarters up where griffin claw marks had managed to land and climb back up. The dragons hadn’t shown any signs of rising a second time.
The lonely ball of light at last hovered a hundred yards away and excitement to have finally climbed the exhausting steps. The wind threatened to knock anyone unprepared over and off into the air. Controlling himself, Cage gently took one step at a time and hugged the wall, keeping the lantern lit.
Then he reached the platform and was disappointed for there were no more stairs, just a single platform. “Where the hell am I supposed to go now?!” He growled. The wall was smooth as glass with no hand holds anywhere to climb out of this place.
It’s a dead end!
Or so Cage first thought as he then realized the orb began moving. It began rising, leaving the platform of flat stone, sailing through the cavern. Another mile higher and two away did Cage realize he was being led across as it stopped just inside another tunnel entrance that would be impossible to climb to. Nothing could ever be thrown that far and successfully find purchase to cross. No throw, arrow or gas powered projectile could accurately reach it. The only way was to fly across.
It was already clear Cage was the first human to reach this far, but through narrowed vision also proved from this angle that nothing had ever reached the lone visible tunnel being illuminated.
Think! Think! Think! He mentally tasked his thoughts. “There has to be a way.” He whispered and opened the lantern fully to brighten the dark cavern. “There won’t be any more help… likely. No matter how difficult something is, there is always a way. Jumping blindly will kill me from up here, especially with the downburst… The angles of the walls are clearly unnatural. The slopes, curves and slick flatness serve to intensify the naturally strong wind. The pattern seems random, but constantly dictate how everything behaves. This will take some time.”
Cage turned a knob to dim the lantern after he roughly sketched a layout of the valley, emphasizing the opposite wall, the intentional crafting of the stairs to make it near impossible to get back on and calculated accurate distances.
Over the next five days Cage sat on the platform, creating intricate mathematics on angles and reactions made by wind when being forcibly changed to get stronger in a confined space. Magic still remained beyond reach, but it wasn’t a surprise anymore. Nothing was left out. It felt good to be able to fall back on his mental aptitude and by the time he calculated for every dangerous angle and mundane variable an entire book was filled.
Turns out that there was only one way to navigate an invisible gauntlet and over six and a half million ways to die. If the one path wasn’t correct to the inch it would be broken and the individual on it would be pulled into a sure death and sped down to the ground at over six hundred miles per hour.
Cage spent the remainder of the fifth day mentally preparing for his flight. Without wings there was no conceivable way of success, but
he was set. Any other human mages would not stand a chance. He programmed the timing into his mental movements, even a minor mistake would be deadly.
In the morning, feeling mentally and physically refreshed, Cage stretched everything so as to beat this near impossible challenge. Then the lantern was stored away in a pocket and a grin started to spread while adrenaline sharpened the senses and reaction time.
“Wing-suit Mode!” He called out. Black diamonds began to sparkle faintly in activation of a programmed sequence, latched onto the spider silk of the robe and began adjusting the excess fabric. The sleeves and legs tightened precisely to his form better than any glove. The snug fit didn’t stop as the excess began reforming into sturdy sails that reached from the wrist to ankle while between his legs they formed an airtight wing. Before even attempting the glide he picked up a few loose rock chips and tossed them around the launch platform. Only the one to the right shot the debris up into the darkness.
One steadying breath was all Cage needed before throwing himself out. His arms stretched straight to the side while his legs spread. Immediately an updraft lifted him a hundred feet before a joining current took him away from the tunnel as predicted. To combat any outside problems he closed his eyes.
He counted calmly as if taking a stroll. At six seconds he folded his arms and closed his legs before a crosswind could snatch him away. Three seconds later he opened up and felt his wing-suit catch air and be sent in a slow, upwards spiraling vortex just outside the downdraft for fifteen seconds. Then he folded his left arm to blow to the right or be dumped inside the downburst like a sugar cube in coffee. He was swirled aside before being lifted again at a thirty degree angle. Nine seconds later he closed his legs to swoop vertically, open them and get caught in a switchback motion to drop twenty feet before tucking in a ball to flip over and snap his limbs out and catch the most powerful updraft yet. It was a thousand foot ride straight up before Cage leaned to the right and exited all currents. His calculations didn’t know exactly where that mega updraft would lead for it was too dark to trust.
At last he opened his eyes in the calm part where tempests swirled madly all around. He needed to see and located the tunnel a full mile away and below his position. He made a minor adjustment by leaning forward, knowing only one issue remained. He picked up speed by the angle chosen, a necessity to the ideal calculations and aimed just above the tunnel.
Fifty feet away Cage streamlined his form before curling into fetal position to limit surface area not a millisecond too late as he ran though a fifty mile an hour updraft just outside the tunnel entrance.
Blackness consumed like a gelatin ball around the warlock as he shot into the tunnel and bounced off the floor and roof till rolling to a stop. It dissipated, revealing a widely grinning Cage. “HELL YEAH!!!” He crowed loudly as the realization he made it set in. He sat up saying “Default Mode.” and punched the air, hardly believing it all worked out according to plan.
Looking around for any markings was futile. By all indication, Cage knew he was the first to make it this far. Others stronger, older, possibly smarter and more cruel all failed to survive. It made the warlock grin all the more for he was better than them all. Flying wasn’t the solution to surviving, it was gliding and planning, knowing how to move and when to do it.
The orb flashed for attention and for once Cage didn’t have time to think. The ground began to shake and the orb shot ahead down the tunnel. Where the warlock entered began crumbling away, making sure it could never be used again. Cracks began spider-webbing along the floor and dome ceiling, falling away and down for a cave-in.
Relishing the adrenaline, Cage took off after the orb while behind followed certain death. Long legs sprinted, staying just ahead of the rumble, but it’s chase wasn’t over.
A hole opened up fifty feet ahead, jagged and twenty feet wide, growing wider by the second. Too far to jump, the warlock relied on Parkour training as he angled to the wall and ran along its side for five steps before springing off, angling for the floor that had yet crumble. He tucked and rolled as he hit and the momentum completed and altered into another run. His robe had already split and became close fit pants automatically, not needed an explanation or verbal command.
Still he could not stop as the tunnel collapsed. Training and reacting is all that saved Cage from oblivion as rocks and boulders began falling from overhead. Dodge, twist, sprint is what he did for a whole mile, but he couldn’t stop. The orb offered enough light to do this, giving light, hope and timing for what lay ahead.
Soon a fissure opened up ahead, over four feet wide in the shrinking tunnel after following the light down a fork. It was longer than he could see, but wider than the floor, making it impossible to run. Instead Cage leapt at a wall, his feet finding a solid grip on the dry, rough stone wall and he managed to hop from one wall to the next, avoiding the bottomless fissure between his legs. It tested his endurance to inhuman levels, but he could not slow as the tunnel continued to collapse and was gaining speed.
If it doesn’t stop soon it will be over! Cage cursed mentally while keeping his focus on timing and precise muscle control. A rock clipped his right shoulder, but bounced off the hard flesh with more on the way down his peripheral vision noted.
Then the orb left the tunnel and went up suddenly, but not before showing a metallic, horizontal bar with a width a little over two feet.
Timing the jump for his better left leg wasn’t difficult. Just as the roof crumbled down he shot out into the open with hands out. The cold metal bar held rigid as it took his full weight and the swing had Cage holding for dear life before flipping like a gymnast on the uneven bars. He flipped and snatched out, finding the bar was actually a ladder. Below all the air was expelled, sending dust and stone out into a cave, another big one. The warlock held still, allowing his shaking legs to still and catch his ragged breath. “Damn, this place is really trying to kill me.” He chuckled as his adrenaline ebbed. The ladder was somehow unaffected by the collapse below his feet, but shook as the collapse began to still.
It was only then Cage realized something, the air didn’t smell of sulfur anymore. Just cool underground earth.
“Please work.” He whispered and focused. In his hands appeared a tiny flicker between his finger.
Magic had been restored!
As if sensing his use, the orb several feet overhead vanished without a sound, but the tiny sparkle in his palm didn’t allow darkness to completely rule. It was new hope, even if it was just a sparkle. Weeks of being blocked from magic would take time to leave his system. The warlock said “Phone call, Meeka.” But like last time, he tried yesterday, the diamonds twinkled, but then died. He closed his eyes and held completely still. He felt the ever present sensation and probed the bond between Familiar and Summoner.
Back on Cage Island Daku suddenly lifted his head and jumped to all fours, startling everyone in Cage’s living room. Tohka, Meeka, Brooke, Sean, Rena, Frill, Megdline, Zikon and outside the open front door was Theresa’s great purple eye. “CAGE!” he shouted, startling the entire room. They all had seemed to jump out of their skin, just as he had as he knew the sensation and touch of his human. The room ran to him, expecting his death had finally come and foretold the loss of both one of a kinds. They spoke all at once and stopped as he didn’t collapse immediately after. Through the mind-link Daku heard “Hey buddy! It worked! They didn’t ward against the link between us, but I cannot reach out any other way. Tell everyone I’m still trapped and will be strong enough to escape hopefully by tomorrow. My magic just came back and I can barely manage a spark let alone teleport.”
“Silence!” Daku roared as everyone before him yelled for answers. “I can barely hear him!” Zikon spelled the room of people and rendered them unable to speak. Three concerned women drew weapons at the great sorcerer, but didn’t move as Megdline touched her throat and showed he silenced her too. Daku closed his eyes and said “I can sense him, but cannot point to where. Be silent while I commune.�
� And closed his excited blue eyes. “Oh how good it is to finally feel you live again… you are exhausted and impaired. Your legs are barely holding you.”
“No shit! Really?” The warlock mocked in good humor. “Listen, I’m losing you. My body’s exhausted, I’m holding onto a metal ladder on a sheer cliff that goes higher than I can see and my magic has been impaired up till now. Right now I need info. Is my family okay?”
“All are healthy and worried about you.” Daku began, sensing his partner’s concentration slipping. “The human Raul is dead by my hand, just after you were stolen. Zikon has taken liberty to be with Megdline, going back and forth to Twilight since she will not leave the island till your return. Rex Gralla has established four soldier dragon elders to defend your territory and has also taken liberty to reside here with six other ancients to be with me and learn of Tohka’s binding. They all worry you would die any second and have made this place their main priority. They want all the information to be precise before we are lost to them… idiots. You have been gone forty three days, My Friend.”
“Well my body has been messed up, not surprising my sleep cycle has made my count less. To me it’s been just thirty two. Be sure no one tampers with my spells or I’ll be pissed.”
“ Got that in hand. Poli has taken it upon herself to sense any tampering to the control crystals behind the waterfall, those of our nest and the other nests. She personally bit an elder’s tail when she caught the other females tampering.”
“Good… last thing before I go.” Daku felt their connection slipping fast. “Make a list of… every person who doubts my return and tell them when I get the hell out of here I expect them to kiss my ass!”
Ascension of the Warlock (Book 4 of the Death Incarnate Saga) Page 34
