“Let’s go see what we can do,” Lady Weun said.
* * * * *
“I’ve never seen nothing like them before,” Ine grunted, leading them forward carefully, deeper and deeper into the hole in the mountain.
Illumination pods along the walls provided ample light as the three of them moved through the bowels of the caverns. The air grew cool and clammy, heavier and danker with each step. Some sort of occasional glimmer along the wall caught Mencari’s eye. At first he discounted what he thought were natural deposits of a fluorescent substance. Perhaps noticing Mencari’s glance, Ine pointed to one such spot and said, “From the creatures. Leave ’em as they move.”
Lady Weun stopped and examined the spot. A dry, scratchy shrill echoed around them. “Sounds like crystals sliding against one other,” she said.
Ine’s body noticeably stiffened. “That’s what we heard when we ran into ’em the first time.”
He darted over to a storage cavity carved into the rocky wall, retrieving an additional pick, like the one he carried. He gave it to Mencari saying, “The beasts are crystal . . . not indestructible.”
Mencari tried a few half-swings, getting used to the makeshift weapon. After a moment, he said, “One wrong blast from my hand-phaser could bring this place down. So this is probably a better option here.”
The scratching grew louder, until a blue-and-silver glow emanated from around the corner. Ine cautiously crept forward and peeked around the edge. “That’s one of ’em!” he quivered in a hushed tone.
Lady Weun and Mencari joined him. In an odd glow ahead, a huge spider-shaped creature that was easily twice their size was skittering about. Strangely, it looked as if it had been carved from the very mine walls themselves, made of the same shiny crystal.
Ine looked back, desperation on his face. “We have to get past it to get to where the other men are.”
Lady Weun looked at Mencari. “We need a plan.”
He took another quick look at the spider, took in the eerie luminosity that seeped from a pattern of light blue-and-silver crystals on its body. Its crystal appendages clicked when they touched the ground, making the sound they’d heard before. The beast’s movements were slow, which was to their advantage. But its every action appeared precise. It did not look like a weak or uncertain creature, but rather like one stalking its prey.
With nowhere to conceal themselves, they retreated back the way they came, checked their weapons, and waited for the creature to approach.
When it rounded the corner, its long stony fangs bared, Ine and Mencari hefted their picks.
Its bulging diamond-like eyes locked on the intruders; it hissed and bared a second set of fangs, ones previously tucked under the first. These appeared made of gems, as did its strange eyes.
“I’ll need some space to throw my crystals,” Lady Weun whispered while she pulled a few more gems from her pocket. “Attack before it gets close!”
Mencari and Ine began a forward charge, yelling and swinging their picks. The creature spat a mist of liquid. As the substance tumbled through the air, it turned milky white and spread like a web. They skidded to a stop, preparing to slice through it. Lady Weun threw a green-yellow gem that shattered and released a gust of air, causing the web to fold in upon itself and stick harmlessly to the cavern wall.
The creature scuttled up to Ine, lashing out with its razor-sharp legs, but Ine blocked the attack using his pick. Mencari flanked the beast, striking one leg with his pick, deeply fracturing it. As the beast turned to Mencari, Ine bashed another leg, cracking through the appendage. The limb shattered into tiny blue gems and silver beads as it crashed to the ground.
The creature shrieked and spat the sticky liquid at Mencari, coating his chest and arms and gluing his arms to his sides, then swept his legs sending him crashing to the ground. Ine bashed another of its hind legs. It turned to retaliate, as Ine taunted it, trying to draw its attention away from Mencari.
Mencari began to shudder madly. “Burning! It’s burning!”
Lady Weun grabbed one blue crystal and a light-gray one, charged them and threw them at Mencari. The two gems connected in midair and became a fizzling blob that splattered across Mencari’s body. The webbing dissolved from his acid-burned skin, and he was able to scramble away from the creature.
Ine yelled as the creature gored his side with its spear-like leg. Ignoring his own pain, Mencari grabbed his fallen pick and lunged, aiming at the large blue crystal on the creature’s back. It squealed loudly as a fountain of liquid spewed from the gash.
Ine took his pick and plunged it deep into the creature’s head. The squealing subsided and its legs buckled. As it fell, it disintegrated into a mound of blue gems and silver beads. Clear liquid oozed from the middle of the pile.
After she examined and tended the men’s wounds with her green crystals, Lady Weun stepped around the puddle of ooze and examined the gems on the floor. “Odd . . . These silver beads. They can’t be natural. It was a solid mass just a second ago. Now they look like they’ve been cut, polished and processed in a tumbler!”
She picked up a few from the top of the pile, avoiding the clear liquid, and placed them in the pocket of her robe.
“I’ll take them back to my shop,” she said. She glanced at Mencari and added, “I need to sort this out.”
* * * * *
Only occasional and smaller insect-like creatures of crystal challenged their progress as they moved deeper into the mountain. “Odd,” Ine said as they walked. “Only a few are here now, but before we were attacked by hordes of the things. Their legs and wings were as sharp as the big spider’s fangs.”
Entering the deeper sections of the mine, they found unharvested clumps of crystals embedded in the walls. Lady Weun looked at them as she passed, calling out each type as if cataloging. She paused at a large deposit of colored gems, and used Ine’s pick to collect a few.
“We’re getting into the raw section of the cave now,” Ine said.
“Close to the last place that anyone has harvested some of the fire marbles you’re looking for, Rhysus,” Lady Weun added.
As they continued, Mencari noticed an increased number of the gleaming patches along the walls, supposedly left behind by the creatures. The sheer number of the patches concerned him, but not wanting to alarm his companions, he said nothing.
Passing another alcove, he spotted a shape in the dark. Lady Weun jumped back while Ine bared his pick. When nothing emerged from the darkness, Mencari motioned. “Something’s in there.”
He crept toward the alcove. His feet kicked a small pile of amethyst crystals, scattering them across the ground.
“Hang on,” Ine whispered, took an illumination pod from the wall and brought it over.
The light showed the crystals landed in a red puddle. As light drove the darkness back, the sole of a boot emerged. A body came into view, a man’s, unnaturally pressed against the alcove wall.
“No!” Ine cried out, and dropped his pick as he ran to his friend. A three-foot-long crystal spike staked one of the fallen man’s arms to the wall. Deep gashes in the man’s chest revealed the fatal blow.
With Ine’s sobs in the background, Lady Weun picked up a fist-sized amethyst crystal that sat atop a pile of quartz gems. “These crystals look the same as from the other creatures we’ve killed.”
Mencari pointed to the dead man. “It’s the same color as the spike in his arm.”
She turned to Ine. “I’m so sorry about your friend.”
“We should have stayed out after those creatures showed up,” Ine sobbed. He pulled the crystal spike from the dead man’s arm and tossed it aside. It hit the ground and fell into pieces. “I’ll be back for you, buddy, I swear. I won’t leave you here.”
He stood, retrieved his pick and rushed down the cavern. “The breach the things came from isn’t far now.”
Mencari and Lady Weun hurried after him.
New sounds echoed through the cave. Ine paused to listen, the ha
ndle of his pick clutched in both hands. He seemed unsure what to do. A high-pitched squeal caused Mencari to take the lead. As they approached the next turn in the tunnel, colored light flickered on the cave’s far walls. Mencari peered around the bend, but was near blinded by a sudden intensity of the light. He drew back, blinking.
“Couldn’t make out much detail,” he whispered to the others. “Something big. Not a bug. More humanoid.”
Lady Weun whispered, “What’s it doing?”
“Something to the cave wall.”
“We ready?” Ine snapped.
Lady Weun took crystals from her pocket. She mixed in a few small chips from the wall, along with some of those she had collected from the fallen creature encountered earlier in the mine.
“Remember the old saying about fighting a flame with a flame?” she whispered.
Ine nodded, and Mencari said, smiling, “It’s said a little differently where I come from, but the meaning’s the same.”
“Without knowing these crystals’ properties, this might be a mistake. But . . . here goes.”
She closed her fingers over the stones and squeezed. A cry came from around the corner. The colored light abruptly disappeared around the bend. Mencari peeked around the corner and whispered, “It stopped working on the wall. I think it’s headed this way.”
Lady Weun gripped the crystals, adding more power, and the creature let out a second cry. She grimaced confirming her suspicions. “The sooner it gets here, the sooner . . . things will be over.”
Mencari eased back from the corner saying, “It’s coming.”
Ine and he readied their picks and waited. Lady Weun continued charging her crystals. Mencari’s breathing became heavy. Despite his attempts to muffle the sound, it echoed around him.
As the creature rounded the corner, he and Ine lunged at it. Their picks hit, but ricocheted off the hard surface, jarring the weapons from their hands. The beast’s massive arms batted them both out of the way as it boldly stomped towards Lady Weun. Mencari crashed against the unforgiving stone floor, bouncing his head twice before buffering it with his arms. The whole mine seemed to spin, as Mencari fought to stay conscious.
Pushing through the sensation, he lifted his head in time to see Lady Weun charge and throw two sanguine crystals. They exploded on impact, launching the creature backward, embedding it in the mine wall.
It wasn’t enough. The creature recovered quickly, peeled itself off the wall, and turned toward her. Panicked, her hands gripped the mash-up of crystals, and super-charged them. Surpassing mere glowing, they pulsed with power . . . and now, the creature was shrieking in pain. With a roaring scream, she hurled the gems at the beast.
The raw stones embedded in the creature’s chest, making it lurch and stumble about. Deep fissures appeared on its body as intense light flooded from the wounds. It shuddered, then exploded, releasing a burst of air, knocking her to the ground. The supports of the mine moaned.
When all three of them were able to sit up, one by one, shaken and somewhat stunned, they saw the creature had shattered into a mound of red crystals. The gems Lady Weun had thrown sat atop the heap.
“You got it!” Ine cheered weakly.
Lady Weun looked at the pile, startled. She opened her mouth to speak, but Mencari beat her to it.
“Are those fire marbles?”
“I . . . I think so,” she replied in disbelief.
They picked themselves up and went to the pile. “Yes,” she said. “They’re fire marbles, all right. . .” She picked some up and handed them to Mencari with a shaky smile. “I’m not sure how many you wanted, but I’d bet there’s more than enough here to make you happy.”
He fondled them gently in his hands. Along with the radiant red glow, he reveled in the same sense of tranquility generated by the ones at the Trading Post. Just to ensure Andus had enough samples, Mencari picked up another handful and stuffed them in his pocket. After all the chaos, he was relieved to achieve his original mission goals.
He looked at her. “How did you . . . ?”
She shook her head and looked at him with widened eyes. “I think the crystals I took from the first beast did it.”
“Hey, come over here.”
They raced toward Ine’s voice, and found him around the corner where the creature once worked.
“It was doing something over here,” he said pointing. “It’s fresh crystal,” he said. “Like those glimmers we’ve been seeing on the wall, but a whole new section made of it. It must’ve been repairing the breach we made with the drill!”
He ran to the opposite wall and yanked down a few illumination pods, then approached the wall, where there was still a bit of a small unpatched hole.
“Wait!” Mencari called out.
“But what if they dragged the other men back there?” Ine said, and tossed the pods into the darkness. He, and then Mencari, peered inside to see a large, hollowed cavern. Piles of gems dotted the floor, of varying sizes and colors.
Ine pounded on the solid-crystal wall.
“What are you doing?” Mencari said.
“Maybe the others are trapped in there?” Ine said, with a hopeless tone to his voice.
“Over here,” Lady Weun blurted. She was leaning against the wall, pushing on another section of the repaired crystal barrier. “There was another breach fixed here.”
They converged on an opaque crystal slab with no visible handles or hinges. Mencari tried to push it, but was unable to budge it.
She reached up and touched it. “I can feel it, there’s another tunnel just beyond.”
“How do we get through?” Ine said with growing desperation.
Lady Weun’s eyes became glassy, and narrowed. She slipped her hand into her pocket, and withdrew some of the gems she’d taken from the pile. “Step back.”
The unusual hardness in her voice brought quick compliance.
Her hand radiated with red light, the eerie light illuminating her determined face, as she hurled the gems with a powerful overhand throw. On impact, the panel exploded into a hail of crystal shrapnel. A rush of cool air blew in, then faded.
Ine sniffed. “Fresh air. There must be a way to the surface from here.”
He snatched a few of the illumination pods from the floor and charged forward.
They passed through the new opening into a polished corridor of crystal. Lady Weun looked about in amazement. “Smoky quartz. Thousands of tons of it. And . . . it seems so familiar.”
Mencari looked around, realizing they were at the end of a long hallway. “Let’s see where this goes.”
They ventured on, cautious glances reviewing every inch. A dramatic incline in the floor led to a flood of light, and a way to the outside. They shielded their eyes as they stepped out on a sort of small balcony into the sunshine. As his eyes adjusted, Mencari gazed over the edge of a rock-strewn terrace above a deep gorge.
“That’s a long way down,” Ine muttered.
Mencari stepped back and looked across the gorge to see a massive structure. His eye traced along the ornate curves and lavish flourishes of crystal. “What is that?”
Lady Weun stared at it, frozen in place. Finally, she said, “Bertoli Fortress. It’s a place from an old legend. Home.” Her tone was awkward, forced. “Oh, it’s been so long since I’ve called it that, or have been here. And I can’t believe I ever forgot such a place.” She shook her head. “Almost as though I was . . . forced to forget. But why?”
She waved comically, dismissing her lapse in memory with, “Old age . . .”
Tapping sounds echoed from the hallway behind them. Alarmed, they returned to it and found a hoard of tiny creatures standing shoulder-to-shoulder, blocking the tunnel in both directions. The miniature beings seemed of little threat, outside of their numbers. The tallest wasn’t quite a quarter of Lady Weun’s diminutive height. Their bushy red hair looked like flames shooting from their heads and accounted for half their height.
“Adorable, aren’t they?”
she said.
“As long as they stay friendly,” Mencari muttered.
One creature dashed in front of them, then disappeared down the hallway. Ine said, “They’re nothing like what we saw in the mines. Could these guys have made those horrible creatures?”
Emboldened by the lack of response, Mencari edged forward, waving slowly. The creatures scattered into the darkness.
Ine rubbed his chin. “Scared of us?”
“No, fear wasn’t what I saw in their eyes,” Mencari said ominously.
A sound echoed down the hall, this time a heavy, distant clopping.
“Rhysus?” Lady Weun said faintly.
Looking back, Mencari saw Lady Weun swaying back and forth. Rushing to her side, he tried to brace her and asked, “What’s wrong?”
“Something . . . strange.” She looked down the darkened hall, her face twisting between intrigue and fear. Mencari and Ine followed her gaze. A purple glimmering had appeared in the darkness. It wobbled slowly as it approached.
Mencari gasped, lowered her gently to the floor and waved a hand at Ine. “Be ready.”
A second glow appeared, and Mencari held his breath. But instead of an attack, this radiance exposed a robed figure holding something that resembled a lantern. Advancing toward them, each step created a thudding echo down the hall, a sound disproportionate to the figure’s size.
“Intruders! Why are you here?” The voice was deep, threatening and definitely female.
Mencari tensed, hand-phaser charged, and Ine held his pick at the ready. Lady Weun could only utter a weak moan.
CHAPTER 5:
The Living Legend
Scurrying feet echoed behind them. The plodding figure was still twenty yards or so away, so Mencari risked a glance behind him. The tiny creatures had returned to block any thoughts of escape.
“Who are you?” Ine yelled.
The plodding continued, and occasionally, they could see glowing red eyes where the face should have been. A voice boomed from deep within the robe, “Who are you to ask me questions?”
D'mok Revival: The Nukari Invasion Anthology Page 7
