Ominous Odyssey (Overworld Chronicles Book 13)

by John Corwin

  He winced. "Never," he said quickly. "I have never directly spoken with the gods."

  I let him go. "But you said—"

  "I have to keep up appearances," Hippias said. "How could I let the people know that the gods have not spoken to an archon for two centuries?"

  I exchanged concerned looks with the others. "Where do the gods live?"

  "At the top of Olympus." He rubbed his shoulder. "There is only one way up, but it does not work unless the gods will it so."

  Elyssa adopted a gentler tone and offered him a smile. "Where is it?"

  "How do I know you are not the evil ones from beyond?" he asked plaintively.

  "Did we kill your men?" I asked. "Have we threatened to torture you for information?"

  Hippias looked uncertainly around at us. "No, but I have heard the evil ones are cunning."

  "We have a flying ship that could take us to the top," Shelton said impatiently. "One way or the other, we're gonna visit your gods."

  The archon squeezed shut his eyes. "I am the youngest archon to ever serve. I do not wish to be known as the one who betrayed our gods."

  Elyssa crouched in front of him. "The evil your gods spoke of is trying to penetrate the wall separating this place from beyond. We're here to warn them."

  "Scout's honor." I held up my fingers in what I vaguely remembered being the proper sign.

  "Holding your fingers like that isn't scout's honor," Adam said. "That's live long and prosper."

  Shelton leaned closer to Hippias. "Like I said, you can take us, or we'll get our ship to take us. We only swung by here first so someone could introduce us properly."

  Hippias took a moment to consider the offer and finally nodded. "Please follow me." He led us down a hall and to a smaller statue of the Fallen at the end. He pressed the right butt cheek of one of the statues and something clicked. The wall grated outward, revealing a hidden passage.

  "Typical," Shelton muttered. "Next thing you know, we'll find the original Declaration of Independence down here."

  Adam snorted. "I give them points for putting the hidden pressure point on the butt."

  Hippias gave them an uncertain look before grabbing a rod with a glowing sphere on the end and leading us into a rocky tunnel that snaked back and forth for quite a distance. A dark alcove loomed at the end of the tunnel, but the glowing globe revealed what it actually was.

  "That's a levitator shaft like what they use on Seraphina," Shelton said.

  I charged the blue gem on the wall and was rewarded with a glowing white light from within the shaft.

  Hippias gasped and would have tripped over his own feet, but Elyssa caught him.

  "Only the gods should be able to do that," he said.

  "Your gods are Seraphim just like me," I told him. "They have powers, but that doesn't make them gods."

  "Here's hoping they don't blast us the second they see us," Shelton said.

  "I say we let Hippias go first." Adam motioned the nervous archon into the shaft. "I doubt they'll blast him."

  "But I have not been summoned," Hippias said. "They might strike me down on sight!"

  "Nobody's going first," I said, and herded everyone into the shaft. Take us to the top, I commanded the levitator. It responded just like the ones in Tarissa, and an invisible platform beneath our feet shot upward at incredible velocity.

  Smoothly bored rock blurred past in the glowing light of the shaft. Hippias looked up and screamed, throwing up his arms as we approached the roof with enough velocity to smash us flat as pancakes. The levitator slowed and stopped at an opening in the rock.

  I stepped out into a freezing cold room. A fireplace black with ash and soot gaped emptily across the room. Three thrones of pure gold were covered in snow and dust. Golden sconces lined the walls, and what had once been magnificent tapestries hung from the ceiling, their threads rotting and colors dulled.

  Hippias looked around with wide eyes. "It is just as was written in the Book of Archons." He dropped to his knees on the rotting red carpet that lined the floor nearly to the thrones. "That is where the gods held an audience with the archons of Heval."

  "Something ain't right," Shelton said. "Did they have servants up here to take care of the facilities?"

  Hippias nodded. "The gods sometimes chose from among our citizens whenever they needed new servants, but that has not happened for centuries."

  "Let's have a look around." I spotted a gem in the wall behind the thrones and pointed it out to the others. "Probably a door there." A charge of Murk did indeed reveal an opening.

  We stepped through and into a wonderland that drew gasps of amazement.

  A carpet of sunlit clouds spread into the distance to our left and right as far as the eye could see. From this high vantage, I could see the gray walls of Voltis towering so high they seemed to go into outer space. Even though we seemed to be out in the open, there was no wind.

  Shelton picked up a discarded gold wine goblet and tossed it at the clouds. It clanged off an invisible window and fell to the floor.

  "Amazing," Adam said. He walked over and ran his hand along the wall. "It feels like crystal or glass."

  "We are in the very heavens themselves," Hippias breathed. He got on his knees and bowed. "I am not worthy! I am not worthy!"

  I pulled him upright. "You're every bit as worthy as the rest of us."

  He averted his eyes. "I will surely be struck down for this blasphemy!"

  "I'm gonna strike you on the head if you don't shut up about getting struck down," Shelton said.

  Elyssa approached the back wall and traced a finger along an intricate painting that looked as though the Seraphim with blazing red wings might leap from it at any moment. "These are so beautiful."

  Shelton didn't seem as impressed with the statues or busts of other angels and headed for the other door. "Let's find the owners and get this over with."

  "Surely the Fallen must know we're here by now," Adam said.

  Hippias perked up at that. "The Fallen? What do you mean?"

  "Uh, nothing," Adam said.

  Hippias opened his mouth to say more, but the rest of us moved on. The walls in the next room were angled to form a large octagon. Hardly a section of wall wasn't covered with book shelves. Many of the closest were written in Cyrinthian, though I found several that bore strange symbols and were made from material other than paper.

  Adam fingered one of the tomes. "I think this book is made of leather."

  "Even the pages are leather," Shelton said.

  "If I'm not mistaken, I think this is written in Spanish." Elyssa held up another book.

  "Hey, this is The Adventures of Tom Sawyer," Shelton said. "I love this book."

  I found what looked like a large clamshell. "What in the world is that?"

  Elyssa clicked a small clasp, and the shells opened to reveal pages of light green seaweed covered in Cyrinthian symbols. It read: Songs of the Sea – Flagella Learns to Sing.

  "I'd be willing to bet this came from Aquilis," Adam said. "All of these books came from different realms."

  My heart leapt for joy. "You know what that means?"

  Elyssa's eyes lit with hope. "They must have an arch!"

  "Holy farting fairies." Shelton leaned on the bookshelf for support. "We can go home."

  Chapter 26

  We spent the next few hours combing through the palace. Many of the rooms were empty aside from statues, paintings, and countless forms of art from dozens of different realms. I nearly had a heart attack when we ran into one room only to find a hulking Nazdal, its mouth gaping wide, staring out at us from within a crystal case.

  "Ah!" I stumbled back into Elyssa before I realized the creature was frozen in place. Large rusty chains hung from manacles on its neck, arms, and legs—a sign of leadership among the strange creatures. Its size indicated it had drained the life force of many dying creatures.

  Though Nazdal were humanoid, their backs were too malformed to allow them to walk upright, so t
hey crawled on all fours like animals. They also had grotesquely jagged teeth that no army of dentists could ever hope to fix. I'd fought these monsters in the war and prayed I never had to fight them again. They were magic resistant, and could spew out a bloody mist that weakened their prey while they drained its life.

  Hippias stared open-mouthed at the creature. "Surely it is an evil one from beyond!"

  "Plenty more where he came from," Shelton said. He walked around the case and whistled. "Man, this place reminds me of the Grand Nexus."

  I joined him and saw what he meant. Dozens of cases, each one with specimens gathered from other realms, filled the room.

  Adam peered closely at a family of Neanderthals. "I think they're under a preservation spell."

  "You mean they're alive?" Elyssa said.

  He nodded. "These gems are probably enchanted with preservation spells, but they're nearing the end of life."

  "Like this one?" Shelton pointed to a case filled with bones and desiccated flesh. It looked like other ancient humans had once been kept inside, but the aethid keeping the preservation spell active had apparently worn out and they'd awakened in an inescapable prison.

  "Awful!" Elyssa said. "We can't just leave these people in here to die."

  "Agreed." I inspected the other cases. "We'll have to come back and figure this out later."

  "Please don't tell me we're releasing that Nazdal." Shelton shuddered. "Man, they must've had a fight on their hands to trap that one."

  "I think I found the servants." Adam peered inside a large case filled with plushy cushions and a harem of scantily clad men and women. Every last male was chiseled with muscle, faces angular and handsome, the women curvy and beautiful.

  "Pretty sure they didn't choose their servants for regular chores," Shelton said with a wink.

  Adam nudged him. "Wishing you weren't married?"

  Shelton pshawed. "I'd rather be with Bella any day."

  Elyssa grinned. "Brownie point earned. I'll be sure to tell Bella."

  He laughed. "I need all I can get."

  "Let's keep looking for the Fall—uh—gods," I said.

  "I have a feeling they aren't here anymore," Adam said. "Wherever they went, they haven't been back in a very long time."

  I had little doubt he was right.

  We searched out the rest of the sprawling palace, discovering all sorts of collectibles from other realms, but there were no Fallen to be found.

  Another levitator took us to the top of a tall spire and into a room with invisible walls. By now, we were used to finding the unexpected and only Hippias freaked out—dropping to his knees and hiding his eyes.

  "I could stay here for days." Elyssa spun in a circle, arms wide and took in the breathtaking view of the clouds far below.

  "I think we're nearly in the stratosphere." Adam looked up where the darkness of space peeked in. "I'll bet the view at night is stunning."

  "This is amazeballs and all," Shelton said, "but we haven't found a single living soul in this place and I ain't seen a single Alabaster Arch."

  Hippias peeked between fingers, opened his mouth, and closed it, apparently thinking better of asking a question.

  "I think we should wake the servants," Adam said. "Maybe there are secret rooms we don't know about."

  I was thinking the same thing. "Wish we'd done it sooner."

  We took the levitator back down and walked to the room with the cases. I charged the gem on the case with the servants. The front of the case misted away and a few seconds later, they began to stir.

  The first person to fully awaken was a woman with long curly hair and dark skin. She blinked and looked at us for several minutes, obviously unsure who we were. "Did they bring you from Eden?" she asked in passable Cyrinthian.

  I nodded. "Yes, from Eden. What part are you from?"

  "Constantinople," she said. "Though others have said it no longer exists."

  Shelton chuckled. "Istanbul was Constantinople. Now it's Istanbul, not Constantinople."

  "The Turks destroy it?" The woman burst into tears.

  Shelton grimaced. "Guess it wasn't as funny as I thought."

  Other servants stretched awake and straggled out of the box, many of them lining up calmly as if they'd done this a thousand times before though there was no shortage of curious looks our way.

  When the last yawns died away, I spoke. "Your masters are not here, so I am in charge." I figured a clear statement of authority was the best way to start.

  The servants broke into panicked screams and attacked. "The god killers are here!" they shouted over and over again.

  I was so shocked that I barely got up a barrier in time to hold them at bay. Hippias used me as a meat shield and ducked behind me.

  The servants banged ineffectually against the shield while I formulated something else to say.

  Elyssa huffed and loosed a piercing whistle. "Shut up!"

  By now the servants realized they weren't able to get to us and backed off, fearful looks contorting their faces.

  "We're not god killers," she said. "The gods have vanished and we're trying to find out where they went."

  Hippias came out from hiding. "It is true. I am Archon Hippias of Heval and we cannot find the gods."

  "Where is Archon Pithias?" a beefy male asked.

  "He died nearly two-hundred years ago," Hippias said. "Much time has passed since the gods made you slumber."

  Jaws dropped and eyes went wide as trashcan lids.

  "Two hundred years?" one female shouted in heavily accented Cyrinthian. "They rarely leave for more than ten years at a time."

  "Our masters are missing!" another woman screeched. "They are gone!"

  Several servants burst into tears, ripping apart what little clothing they had on. Those who weren't crying looked pleased, some of them going so far as to smile.

  "Might I once more set eyes on that faraway home?" asked a man in a hopeful voice. Silky brown hair hung to his shoulders and a neatly groomed goatee framed pouty lips. Bulky shoulder and pectoral muscles bulged against his tight silk shirt. He looked like he hadn't missed a gym day ever. "Immortality hath wrought great sadness upon my soul. My wondrous career as playwright squandered upon so few ears that I might as well have died."

  Shelton made a face like he'd just bitten into a lemon. "The way you talk gives me a headache. Who do you think you are, Shakespeare?"

  The man's eyes widened. "How is it my name comes to thine lips?"

  Shelton flinched as if he'd seen a ghost. "You're supposed to be dead." He looked him up and down. "Damn if you don't look like a male model too!"

  Shakespeare scowled. "Verily did they approach me and promise an eternity of composition should I come hither and thither in their company. But age-dulled and decrepit of mind, was I but a fool."

  "They rejuvenated you?" I waved a hand up and down to indicate his muscular form. "I mean, it looks like they gave you super steroids or something."

  "They promised each of us everlasting life," a woman said. "We just had to accept their terms."

  Elyssa shook her head as if she couldn't believe it. "Are you all human?"

  That drew scores of frowns.

  "Mortals, dust to flesh, flesh to dust," Shakespeare said. "Only the false promise of divinity holds still the reaper's hand."

  "Can you please stop talking like that?" Shelton said. "It's driving me crazy!"

  "He insists," another woman said. "And everyone in his stupid plays talks the same way."

  "It is Old English!" Shakespeare cried. "I will not deflower my native tongue just because it is in Cyrinthian."

  I formed a sphere of sizzling Brilliance in my palm. "Verily shouldst thy words lose the flowers, lest your tongue suffer the wrath of my powers."

  Shakespeare cringed. "Very well, but I will lodge a complaint about this treatment."

  Most of the crying had died away so I lowered the shield and hoped the idiots didn't attack again. "Are there any secret rooms in this palace
? Has anyone here seen an arch or magical gateways used by the gods?"

  The confused looks on their faces told me not a one knew what I was talking about. I groaned and ran a hand down my face. We're so close! But so far, no banana.

  "As a writer, verily must I be observant," Shakespeare said in a condescending tone. "From what I gathered, these beings have been alive so long they suffer from acute boredom."

  "No doubt," Adam said. "It must be a struggle to keep meaning in life after so long."

  "Absolutely." Shakespeare sighed. "I could pen such an amazing tragedy about the lives of these divine creatures. I interviewed each of them in the hopes I could discover more about their backgrounds." He blew out a breath. "Unfortunately, they were not very forthcoming."

  The woman from Constantinople nodded in agreement. "They took long trips, vanishing for years at a time."

  Shakespeare 's lip curled into a snarl. "It is as Mara said, but they always packed us in our cage before such journeys. They would show us prizes on their return—bizarre creatures and art presumably liberated from other places."

  "Did they ever leave you out of your cage before taking one of these trips?" I asked.

  Mara narrowed her eyes in concentration. "Yes, they sometimes grew desperate to satisfy a whim. Like the time they wanted something called pizza, but could not get it from here or Atlantis."

  Shelton moaned. "Mmm, pizza!"

  "They departed and returned days later," Shakespeare said. "It was the only time I watched them go because they had just finished watching a performance of Romeo and Juliet Part Two."

  Adam scratched his head. "Part Two? But I thought there was just the one."

  Shakespeare's eyes lit up. "Despite the centuries separating our births, you know of my works?"

  "Man, who doesn't?" Shelton groaned. "Reading those thing was a friggin chore in school."

  "Literature is not for the weak-minded or the unimaginative," Shakespeare said. "Gallifer demanded I write a sequel where the lovers came back to life. He despises tragedies."

  I waved off further literary discussion. "Where did the gods go when they left?"

  Mara pointed straight up. "We performed the play in the observatory. Once it was over, Purah grew very irritable because she was tired of the food. They settled on pizza and told us they would return within a few days."