by Dave Morris
A buoy loomed out of the darkness. Its wood had been chewed away by countless tides, its iron fretwork reduced to clots of dark red rust. Two lines of writing were carved into the rotted wood.
‘Stop here,’ said Caelestis to the boatman.
Altor looked at him quizzically.
Caelestis leaned over to study the writing, then shook his head. ‘I thought it might be a warning of what’s ahead, but I can’t read it.’
There was a heavy iron chain attached through a link to the side of the buoy. It trailed down into the deeps. ‘What do you think that is?’ said Altor.
‘It’s obvious. You pull on it and it drains the lake.’ Caelestis watched the puzzled look spread over Altor’s face before cracking a smile. ‘No, I don’t know. Treasure, maybe?’
Neither of them noticed that the boatman had grown suddenly nervous. His lean fingers twitched as he gripped the oar, but he said nothing.
Altor came to a decision. ‘We can’t afford to ignore it; it might be something we need. Give me a hand to pull it up.’
They hauled on the chain. At first it refused to budge, but then with a slow sucking of lake-bed mud it began to give. Altor pulled up hand after hand of dripping rust-caked links, and at last the object on the other end came into view. It was a metal gibbet cage containing a mire-coated skeleton.
An emerald talisman winked in the dim light. Caelestis reached for it, only to jump back like a startled cat as the skull’s eye sockets gave a blaze of green light.
Quickly Altor let go of the chain. As the grisly catch slipped back into the depths, plumes of green vapour rose from the bones. Bubbling and seething noxiously above the water, they began to weave together, coalescing into a monstrous diffuse shape...
Altor and Caelestis drew back aghast as a luminous phantom formed with clutching talons and eyes like beacons.
‘Free!’ it howled in a hollow voice. A ghastly rictus spread across its face. ‘Now you who have freed me must take my place.’
Altor cut with his sword as the phantom reached towards them. The blade passed through its fingers with no more effect than it would have had on smoke. But the two comrades could feel the deathly energy of the phantom’s claws like waves of icy air in their face. It might not be solid, but they were in no doubt that it could kill them all the same.
Missing Altor by inches, the phantom’s fingers clawed into the awning. There was a sound like the sky tearing and the awning ripped apart into billows of royal blue. Realising its mistake the creature gave a howl of outrage and a bolt of icy green flame emanated from its grinning maw. The awning caught alight like dry paper. Caelestis sprang up and pulled the rest of the awning off its frame, dodging the leaping flames and wobbling precariously as the boat rocked.
Altor, sprawled on the floor of the boat, fumbled for his sword. As Caelestis flung the blazing fabric overboard into the black water the cave went momentarily dark, allowing Altor to see a bright glow emanating from his sword. Snatching it up, he rose in a low balanced posture and in one smooth movement swung again at the phantom.
The sword sliced through empty air as before, but this time Altor thought he felt a slight tug, as if the blade had in fact caught on something as it passed through the creature. The phantom’s eerie green glow flickered for a moment like a guttering torch.
‘ Swim for it!’ yelled Caelestis. ‘We can’t fight this thing!’
Altor was preparing for another swing. ‘Not yet!’ he called. ‘The sword can hurt it.’
The boat rocked crazily again, throwing Altor off balance, and there was a splash in the water behind them.
Caelestis looked behind him. The sinister boatman had gone. Some distance away something was moving rapidly away, not swimming but gliding along just below the surface of the water like an eel. So even the mythical boatman Keron didn’t care to confront this shrieking phantom. Caelestis needed no convincing. His instinct for self preservation, honed in the backstreets of a dozen teeming cities, told him it was time to get out. He turned to call to Altor again.
Then he heard the scrape of claws along the planks of the boat. The phantom, plunging its claws into the water, was trying to crack open the hull like a nut.
Altor was getting to his feet again when he was snatched from behind by Caelestis, who launched them both into the water. Just in time—an instant later the phantom’s hand came stabbing through the planks and the boat split like kindling. Caelestis heard its hollow roar of rage at missing its prey, then the water enveloped him in throbbing silence.
Altor got a lungful of lake water and flailed in panic for a few seconds. As he got a grip on himself, he turned towards the dim light above and kicked up towards the surface. He seemed to rise slowly as though engulfed in a tar pit, but at last his head broke the surface. He gagged and spat out the murky water which tasted of chill decay. It was so horrible that for a few moments he could do nothing but tread water, spluttering to clear his mouth of the vile taste.
Not far off the phantom was demolishing the boat in silence, the only sounds the snapping and crunching of wood. Slowly, as Altor watched, it dispersed into wisps of green mist that hung for a moment in a venomous cloud and then drifted off across the lake.
Altor was relieved to discover he had not lost his grip on the silver sword. He looked around. ‘Caelestis?’ he said. He twisted from side to side in the water, scattering spray in a large arc, as he scanned the cavern in the dim light.
But there was not even a trail of bubbles to show where his friend had gone under.
As he looked around in panic he became aware of a green light in the murk. It was the talisman that had hung around the skeleton’s neck. It was sinking back to the lake bed, drifting away and down like thistledown on the breeze. Near it, having smashed the boat and found no victims to feast on, the phantom broke apart into tatters of vapour. The vapour seethed and swirled, coiling into the water as it was sucked back into the talisman.
Altor stared at the fading green light. As his eyes penetrated further into the gloom he could see a large shape moving under the water, thrashing from side to side like the tail of an enormous fish. But it wasn’t a fish. What was it?
He was about to turn and swim away when something broke the surface of the water. A silver-buckled boot with miniver trim.
‘Caelestis!’ called Altor.
Caelestis’ foot kicked wildly and then was snatched back under again. He was in the throes of a desperate struggle with something in the water.
Altor cried out although Caelestis had no hope of hearing him: ‘Caelestis, no! Leave it! You’ll drown!’
He launched himself towards the glow, swimming downwards with all his strength. Caelestis had obviously tried to retrieve the treasure. Now his fingers were locked on the emerald, his arm caught in the bars of the cage as it bore him inexorably down into the depths.
Drifting mud made a dark cloud over the lake bed. As Caelestis sank into it it was as though he was being blotted out of existence. Altor saw his friend’s face outlined in green light against the blackness just below him—eyes wide with panic, hair snaking like seaweed, bubbles gushing out of his mouth as he tried to scream.
Caelestis’ free hand drifted up. Altor knew he had one chance. He made a grab for the hand and their fingers touched...
Eight:
Imragarn
Caelestis became aware of several things: hard rocks under his head, a crushing weight on his chest, and a bitter taste like grit in his mouth. It took him a few moments to realize that this meant he was still alive. He sat up and immediately vomited black water all over his waistcoat.
When the spasm in his guts had finally passed, he lay back with a groan. Somehow he had reached the far shore of the lake. Nearby stood something that looked like a large block of ice or glass. At the head of the shore a tunnel led further into the Battlepits, a faint light twinkling at the end of it.
‘You’re an idiot,’ said Altor’s voice near to him. ‘A greedy idiot. You just had t
o have that talisman.’
Caelestis tried to speak and had a coughing fit instead. After it had passed he managed to say weakly: ‘It was so close. But I got my arm caught in the cage. I had the emerald in my hand.’
Altor interrupted him. ‘How do you feel?’ he said coldly.
Caelestis eased himself back into a sitting position. Altor was crouching nearby, carefully drying his sword with a scrap of cloth. His short broom of hair was plastered down across his forehead in soggy honey-coloured strips.
‘I don’t think you need to worry about rust,’ said Caelestis in a miserable voice. ‘Whoever heard of a magic sword rusting? Where’s my cloak, by the way?’
‘It’s difficult enough to rescue a drowning man while hanging on to one’s sword,’ said Altor. ‘Something had to go, and I’m afraid it was the cloak.’
‘You lost it in the lake?’ Caelestis gazed bleakly out over the water where, to make matters worse, he now noticed his fine hat drifting half-sunk across the dark ripples. ‘I don’t believe it. Do you know what that cloak cost?’
‘About as much as your waistcoat?’
Caelestis looked down. The pale silk of his shirt was streaked and torn, and the waistcoat itself was drenched in bile. Something resembling a fleshy barnacle was sucking at one of the purple jewelled button. With a sigh he ripped the waistcoat off and cast it into the lake.
‘That’s that, then. I might as well just lie down here and die, because things can’t get any worse.’
‘Don’t be stupid,’ said Altor. He got up and crunched across the pebbles to examine the block of ice. Beyond, against the rear wall of the cavern, was a bronze shrine flanked by fiercely burning braziers.
‘Come and look at this,’ he said.
Heaving a sigh, Caelestis got wearily to his feet and ambled over. After one look at the block of ice he was leaning forward intently, all complaints and discomforts forgotten.
‘There’s somebody in there..!’
The figure of a warrior clad in leather armour was just visible in the murky heart of the ice. He had his back to them. Altor walked around to the other side, where a gauntleted hand protruded from the block. It seemed that someone had chipped away at the ice in order to get at the warrior’s sword.
‘This is recent,’ said Altor, running his fingers over the grooves in the ice.
‘Maybe another of the champions passed this way. He might have lost his own sword in the lake.’
Altor touched the hand. It was cold, but not stiff as death should have made it. ‘This fellow might still be alive.’
‘You want to thaw him out?’ muttered Caelestis, nodding towards the nearby braziers.
Altor strode over to the shrine and hefted one of the braziers. The flames trailed a plume of crackling gold in the dank air.
‘Hold on a minute,’ protested Caelestis. ‘What’s the point? The guy’s got no sword to take, and I don’t fancy any of his clothes.’
‘He might be another challenger like us.’
‘So?’
Altor began to position the other brazier. ‘So he might be able to tell us something useful.’
‘He might be dead,’ grumbled Caelestis. Seeing that Altor was not to be deterred, he went on: ‘Look, I know you’re from a monastery and no doubt you’ve sworn to help those in need, but don’t you think this is carrying charity a bit too far? While we’re wasting time here, the other champions are getting further ahead.’
Altor set his jaw in a stubborn expression. ‘You go on if you want, but I’m not leaving him here. Even if he is dead, he deserves better than to be left forever in a block of ice.’
Seeing that further discussion would be futile, Caelestis merely shrugged and sat down for a rest.
Once Altor had moved both braziers closer, the ice was soon melting. The block emitted strange snapping and creaking sounds as it shrank. Using a large rock, since he did not want to damage his sword-hilt, Altor smashed away until he had freed the man frozen within. From the tooling on his leather armour to the lashes on his lightly closed eyes he was perfectly preserved, as though all the time he had been encased in ice he was merely sleeping.
‘He’s going to fall over in a minute,’ observed Caelestis.
Altor dropped the rock and placed his hands gently under the man’s arms, surprised to note that the braziers were also drying out the water on the man’s clothes so that it came off him in waves of steam. As the ice subsided, the man’s full weight fell onto Altor and he grunted with the effort. He glanced across at Caelestis. ‘Are you going to give me a hand?’
Caelestis brushed disconsolately at some mud that worked into the plush fabric of his trousers. ‘It wasn’t my idea to thaw him out in the first place,’ he said sourly.
Then the last of the ice slid away and the man’s full weight collapsed completely onto Altor. Although he was braced for it, the young monk was nevertheless caught off balance and found himself toppling back onto the pebbles. For a moment he lay there pinned, unable to get the leverage to lift the man off.
‘He’s heavier than he looks,’ he grunted.
Caelestis reluctantly ambled over and helped to lift the inert body so that Altor could wriggle free.
‘Stop groaning,’ grumbled Caelestis. ‘You were only winded.’
‘I didn’t groan,’ panted Altor, getting to his feet.
They both heard it then: a distinct groan from the body lying amid the chunks of melted ice.
Altor knelt and felt the man’s brow, then dragged him nearer to the braziers. ‘He is alive!’ he cried excitedly.
The man’s eyelids fluttered open. Wisps of steam were still coming off his clothes as the heat from the braziers gradually warmed him. His long hair hung across his face in a lank curtain. In the leaping firelight it gave him a demonic appearance.
He turned his head and slowly looked around. As the focus came back into his eyes he turned in the direction of Altor and Caelestis.
‘What happened?’ he said, his voice croaking slightly. A shiver rippled through his body but then he took a deep breath to bring it under control. When he next spoke his voice was steadier. He looked calmly at the two young adventurers. ‘The last thing I remember is my old chum Fashmar getting killed by that frost wizard. Then he flung a spell at me...’
Altor quickly filled him in while Caelestis looked on sceptically.
The man listened and shook his head slowly. ‘Then I have been frozen here for almost a decade,’ he said in a low voice. ‘I came into the Battlepits with several companions. We were the champions of Magus Laglor. You didn’t find any others like me, then..?’ He glanced along the shore.
Altor shook his head. ‘You were the only one.’
The man slumped for a moment, overcome by a stab of grief, then he looked up. ‘My friends, I owe you my life.’
‘Who are you?’ said Caelestis in a tone that made no effort to disguise his hostility.
Altor glared at him, but the stranger managed a weak smile. ‘Your suspicions are understandable, young man. The Battlepits are no place to forge a friendship. But rest assured that Imragarn of Achtan does not forget his debts.’
‘That is your name, then? Imragarn?’
‘He has said so, hasn’t he?’ demanded Altor, embarrassed. ‘Where are your manners, Caelestis?’
He waited for Caelestis to apologize. Caelestis said nothing. After a moment, Imragarn got unsteadily to his feet, shrugging as if he did not mind Caelestis’ open distrust. He looked between the two glowering youths. ‘There is an expression in my country: manners are best kept next to a ready sword. I will earn your trust, my friends; I have no right to demand it.’
Caelestis kept his sceptical frown, but he said: ‘Anyway, what do the rules of the contest say about this kind of thing? I suppose you’ll have to join us, but are you now one of Balhazar’s champions like us, or are you still working for Magus Laglor?’
Imragarn mustered a half-smile. ‘Neither or both, for all it matters to me. When I cam
e down here nine years ago I was full of dreams of gold and glory. Now I’ll be glad just to get out alive.’
‘There’s only one route,’ said Altor, pointing to the passage at the head of the shore. He led the way towards it and the others followed. Caelestis was careful to lag behind Imragarn where he could keep an eye on him.
The walls of the passage were smooth stone, and at the end was a vestibule in front of huge double doors. There was one curious feature about these doors. The carvings on them, which showed a gladiator locked in bloody battle with a dragon, were upside down.
‘I heard a legend about this...’ began Imragarn. He shook his head in confusion. ‘No, it’s gone. I feel like I’ve been dreaming... there’s so much forgotten.’
Caelestis had no patience for listening to the man’s rambling. He stepped forward and helped Altor push the doors, which swung back to reveal a long hall lit by glimmering chandeliers.
But the hall too was upside down.
Stunned by the sight, the three advanced along the ceiling between two rows of chandeliers that stood like huge bronze mushrooms. The candles set into them trailed feathery nimbuses of light that hung down in defiance of gravity.
Then they saw that their footsteps disturbed dust on the ceiling that fell up past them, trickling off towards the floor high overhead. It wasn’t the candle flames that defied gravity. It was the three adventurers themselves.
‘That is because you are the intruders here,’ said a voice in answer to the thoughts of all three of them.
A light blossomed at the far end of the hall, where a thin figure sat on a monumental throne of swirling-veined marble. His robes spread around him like a pool of molten gold and his skin was a rich ebony black, his eyes sparkling star-bright in the gloomy vastness of the room.
