by Rain Oxford
“What does it say?”
“They fear it for good reason. It’s not just a god-killer. The sword is ancient, but no one has ever proven its existence. It’s cursed that each time it is drawn, it must take a soul. If the wielder can’t kill someone, he’ll die.”
“What does it look like?”
“I don’t know. The rest of the scroll is missing.”
“Well, that’s never good. Can we deal with this in the morning?” I yawned.
“Yeah, sure. I’ll be in the library.”
“You need sleep.” That was as far as I got, though. As interested as I was in the assignment, I either needed coffee or more sleep.
* * *
This time, I woke feeling well rested, but I decided not to open my eyes. At least, that was my plan until I felt something watching me. I opened my eyes to find my brother leaning over me with a knife. “What the fuck?!”
“Damn it, I didn’t want to wake you. Hold still, this will be quick and painless,” he said slowly, as if trying to sooth me.
“Luca, we can talk this out. I’m your brother.” I tried to scoot back, but he pressed down on my chest with his free hand.
“Don’t move!” he ordered harshly.
“Did they do something to you? Did I? Is this because I made you Luca?”
Staring me right in the eye, he stabbed… the bed beside me.
I made a perfectly manly shriek of shock until I realized he hadn’t been trying to kill me. He grabbed my arm and pulled me up. An inch from where my throat had been was a foot-long, sand-colored scorpion with Luca’s dagger plunged into its back. Its two-inch-long stinger, dripping with venom, thrashed wildly as the arachnid died. I shuddered violently and pulled out a Brew-Chew. “I want to go home.”
Luca punched me in the arm. “Did you really think I was going to kill you?”
“No, of course not. I was trying to fake out the scorpion.”
“Liar. I should fucking stab you for thinking something like that.”
“I’m sorry, okay. It was really creepy. Thank you for saving me. Did you get any sleep?”
“No, but more importantly, I want to show you something.”
“Can we eat first?”
A knock on the door cut Luca off. “Come in,” he said.
Homa entered. “You both are invited to eat with everyone. If you would prefer not to, however, we can bring food to you.”
“We’ll join you.”
“Yes. I have a ton of questions.”
“Don’t pester them,” I warned. “They saved us.”
“There is no harm in asking questions. An inquisitive mind is one that can expand indefinitely.”
“That’s an answer from someone with no secrets,” Luca said approvingly.
“Do you have any idea how to find your way around here?” I asked Luca as we were led through the undistinguishable halls.
“Sure, bro. All it takes is memorizing the direction.”
“That’s not an easy task.”
“We have different talents,” he said with a shrug. “It’s a good thing; it’s what makes us work so well.”
He was right. He always followed my lead, but he wasn’t an idiot. Although his historical information wasn’t often useful in our endeavors on Earth, his talents ranged far and wide. He could memorize a ridiculously long code of numbers and could pick up languages easier than anyone I knew. He never forgot anything I told him. He could also break the tension in any room when he wasn’t too busy building it.
When we reached the dining room, I was surprised. It wasn’t grand like the room we had fallen into. It was only roughly twenty feet by ten feet, with ten small, rectangular tables, which each sat six people. The tables and chairs were wooden. On the tables were candles.
Three dozen people, including five children, were chatting merrily as they ate. They wore robes of all different colors and every one of them was tattooed in some way. When we entered, everyone fell silent.
Then Cisie stood from her seat at the table farthest from the door and beckoned us. I sat next to her and Luca sat next to me. Homa sat across from me in the only remaining seat. A moment later, three people brought Homa, Luca, and me plates of food and metal cups of water.
The food was bread, and it was dry.
“How do you grow anything underground?” Luca asked.
“We open the roof.”
“And water?”
“The underground cities were built around the underground rivers.”
While we ate, Luca asked about the history of Syndrial. I tuned a lot of it out just because I wasn’t interested in what the Syndrial version of cave people ate or their funeral traditions. Luca, however, loved it all. They even discussed the development of tools and weapons.
“Everyone here is a caster?” I asked.
“Yes,” Homa said.
“But you don’t take children away from their parents?”
“No, of course not.”
“Then you’re a lot better than the priests. They won’t even let females learn magic. They exile little girls.”
“We know. We have rescued a few of them. No man would be alive if it were not for a woman.”
“Then why are the priests allowed to do what they do? Why are they in charge?”
“Our society has survived for as long as it has because we do not worship the gods. Their society has survived for as long as it has because they do. If we were to leave this city, one of the societies will fall. Whether it is us or them, it is a loss for Syndrial.”
“If it’s just you and you’ve been here for thousands of years… doesn’t that mean there is inbreeding?”
“Certainly not! This is only one of many cities. Not only do our people leave to other cities, but we also take in people we rescue who were exiled from the cities.”
That wasn’t too different from the sand people. I wondered if they would be allies.
Several people asked me about my world, so I described some of my daily life in the most basic way possible. They were especially interested in the fact that I was an author. They had trouble understanding the purpose of fiction, but they were all book-lovers.
“You should translate your book into Common Syndrial,” Luca suggested.
“That would be difficult, since I don’t know how.” When I heard Common Syndrial, it sounded like English. The same was true for writing. “If I read it to a native, maybe they could transcribe it.”
“I think it’s really just based on your intention. I bet if you write another copy with Syndrial in mind, it will come out in Common.”
“I have enough trouble preventing my magic from working on it. I don’t want to create the perfect serial killer on Syndrial.”
“It would be fine; there’s no cereal on Syndrial, so a cereal killer would be harmless.”
“Don’t be a dork.”
“No, I’m being totally serial right now.”
“I hate you.”
“Well, you’re stuck with me. Now, there’s something I need to show you.”
“Fine, lead the way, Scooby.”
We excused ourselves from the meal, but half of the casters had finished and left, so we didn’t think we’d be missed. “Where are you going?” Cisie asked.
“To Hell, but first, we have to get prepared,” Luca said.
“We will come with you,” she volunteered, standing.
“That’s not necessary,” Luca argued. “Nathan and I are really more of a duo, not a band.”
“It is dangerous roaming the city unless you are familiar with it. We will accompany you.” She wasn’t giving us a choice. None of the others agreed or disagreed with her and Luca gave in. We left the room and headed south.
“What’s with the ‘we’ instead of ‘I’ thing? They keep speaking as if they’re all part of a hive or something.”
“I had my suspicions when I heard them repeatedly do that, so I went snooping for something specific. I found exactly what I had been expecti
ng.”
“Well, that’s plenty cryptic. Why do they speak that way?”
“It’s a dragon thing.”
“That’s funny. What’s the real reason?”
He shook his head. “If you’ll shut up, I’ll show you.” We finally stopped at a set of doors and pushed them both open to reveal one of the largest rooms I had ever seen. It was at least thirty feet across, round, and three stories high.
However, we weren’t alone. The creature before us easily filled the room, its resting body reaching ten feet tall. The reptilian beast’s rough scales faded from dark brown on its underbelly to sand-brown on top. Its head was surprisingly velociraptor-shaped with ridges from its nostrils to five sets of increasingly long horns on top of its head. Two more sets of shorter horns were on the side of its head. Spikes down its spine ended with a powerful clubbed tale. Alongside the spinal weapons were two massive, leathery wings, also covered with spikes. The creature’s hands, although not covered in spikes, had a set of five-inch-long, horrifyingly-sharp claws.
“That’s a dragon.”
“I know,” Luca said simply.
“That’s a fucking dragon.”
“Yes, it is.”
“That’s a fucking man-eating fucking dragon.”
“We get it.”
“For fuck’s sake, that’s a f---”
“Dude, enough,” Luca said. “Everyone on Earth was suddenly offended, and they don’t even know why. Why is there a dragon on Syndrial? That’s what I want to know.”
I ate a Brew-Chew.
“He is our protector,” Cisie explained. “He is the reason the gods leave us be.”
“So you swapped out the gods for a dragon to worship?” I asked.
“We do not worship dragons. Instead, we live in harmony together. Verjafriðr rests here, where we watch over him. He is so ancient that he must sleep for many years at a time.”
The door opened and Homa entered. “We need to speak to you outside,” he said.
Cisie followed him immediately and Luca and I followed her, not wanting to be left alone with the dragon. “Are dragons common to Duran?” I asked my brother. “You seem very unaffected by the fact that that was a dragon in there.”
He shrugged. “I’ve seen them before. I tried to get you one for your birthday.”
“There’s a difference between a dragon and a dragon egg. Besides, I figured Painter was joking or crazy.”
“They’re hunted on a number of worlds, so they’re rare now. They’re magic-wielding, fire-breathing, flying, carnivorous, intelligent reptiles that are often capable of speaking with people. That’s a hell of a lot more than what my wife has going for her.”
“Ex-wife,” I said. “You can’t still be married.”
“Duran doesn’t have divorces. Instead, our marriage license expires. If we don’t renew, we’re effectively separated.”
“Why do they get married at all?”
“It’s a way to legally bind people. It’s actually a lot rarer now than it used to be. The legal age is twenty-two, and people can sell their ‘under-aged’ children to someone for money or alliances.”
“Like Autrey’s father did?”
“Yes. She can’t renew the license without me, though.”
“When does it expire?”
“I don’t really know. I think it’s ten years, but it might be more. I wasn’t really paying attention. I loved her and thought we’d be together forever. Besides, they’re changing the laws around.”
“We hate to interrupt what sounds like an extremely important conversation,” Homa interrupted, “but your companion has been looking for you.”
“Companion?”
“Please follow,” he said. We did, and he led us to another room that was identical to ours.
I was starting to wonder if this was some kind of asylum where there were only actually five different rooms, yet endless doors and hallways. I was getting so used to expecting the unexpected (and I had exhausted my shock for the day on the dragon) that I was only a little surprised to recognize the unconscious person on the bed.
“Kailo,” I said. “I assumed he headed north.”
“I assumed he was eaten,” Luca said.
“We rescued him this morning, as he had spent the night looking for you,” Homa said.
“Is he going to be okay?”
“He needs rest and nourishment. He should be fine by tonight.”
“It would probably be a good idea to stick around here during the day,” Luca said. “The desert is dangerous with the sun blaring. Let’s give him a chance to recover and we’ll leave at dusk. Assuming you have a plan to get us north. I’m sure as hell not walking.”
“It would be nice if we had a plane.”
“It would be nice if I had a million dollars. Painter could conjure money.”
“That’s not the point right now. Actually, I might have an idea. Why can’t I conjure a plane?”
“Because you don’t have the energy it would take.”
“What if I took breaks? You built Autrey a castle by conjuring the materials.”
Luca nodded. “Yeah, that would work. With my experience guiding you, a flyable plane should only take you about six months. Also, since Duran doesn’t have planes and I’ve never needed one, I can’t tell you how to actually make it.”
“Then I can levitate us there.”
“Sure. We might even get a hundred feet before you have to stop and rest for an hour.”
“Give me less sarcasm and more helpfulness.”
“If we may interrupt, we have a way for you to go north.”
“How quickly?”
“Quicker than flying. As we said, we are not the only underground city. When people were forced to move underground, we built many cities.” He gestured that we follow him and we did. “To get between the cities, we built tunnels.”
“What about the khapma?” I asked.
“The tunnels are built through rock. We have one that leads directly north, almost to the poles. The city it leads to has been abandoned.”
“That sounds like the perfect place for a surprise monster attack.”
“I call Kailo first to die,” Luca said quickly.
“That’s not cool,” I scolded him. “This isn’t a movie.”
“Five bucks.”
“I’m not betting on a life.”
“Five bucks we get attacked by a monster.”
“I’m not stupid. I’m damn sure we’ll get attacked. It’ll still take a long time to walk to the north, though.”
“We do not intend for you to walk.” We reached a room which was unlike any of the previous.
The room was circular with round holes spaced evenly apart on the wall. In the center was a contraption that resembled a steampunk engine. It was about six feet tall, four foot wide, and six foot deep. It consisted of so many pipes, knobs, pulleys, liquid-filled tubes, gages, and gears that I didn’t know what it was supposed to do.
“This is the heart of our city. It controls the valves for our lighting fluid, the temperature, our access to outside, and our food maintenance. It also controls the tunnels.”
“Do you mean that it locks them?”
“No.” He rotated a large gear that had a metal tooth sticking out. Surrounding it were six words in a circle. The tooth was marking Samkha. “Set it to the city you want to go to and pull the release lever.” He pulled the lever beside it in the down position and I heard pressure release in one of the tubes.
A white capsule slowly glided out of the darkness of one of the tunnels and stopped at the edge. It was five feet in diameter, completely round, and seamless except for a locking wheel. It looked like something out of a science fiction movie.
“Don’t go Star Trek on us now,” Luca said.
“What?”
“Please explain how this thing works,” I said, cutting off Luca’s unhelpful response.
“When you enter, we will close the tunnel and open certain valves.
Pressure will propel you forward at an increasing speed.”
“Wait, you mean this thing will hover? It could get to two thousand miles an hour.”
Homa ignored my words, since he probably didn’t have the same measure of distance. “Halfway through the journey, you will begin to slow.”
“Are there only six other cities?”
“No, but they are all accessible, so it might take several trips to get to the desired city.”
“Well, that’s excellent. All we need now is information on Maori.”
“Which is somewhere in our library.”
“Any chance you know someone who knows about him?”
“Unfortunately, no. We know the history of our people; we don’t focus on the gods.”
“That’s a pretty big hole in your bucket,” Luca said. Homa glanced around, probably looking for a bucket. “The gods were obviously involved in your history, whether you like it or not,” Luca explained. “How your people responded to the gods is a big part of who you are. Until Kailo wakes up, I’ll be in the library.” He left.
After leaving the control room, I happened to look into another open room, which was filled with rusted engines, machine parts, gears, and scraps of material. “What’s this?” I asked.
“These are relics brought down from the surface when the asteroid hit. Unfortunately, it has been so long that we do not know how to use any of it.”
Something shiny caught my attention and I started unburying it. Almost everything was covered in dirt and dust. It took me ten minutes to clear the scrap metal, wires, and machine parts off of it, and when I did, I gaped.
“Holy shit. You have an aircraft.” It was designed like a small, two-seater plane, but it was high-tech. I knew next to nothing about airplanes, but I had figured if they were going to have one, it would be some outdated, military machine. It was in excellent condition for being in the junk pit. Unfortunately, there were too many things on top of it to get a look inside.
“You know what this is?” Homa asked.
“Yes. It’s a machine that you can use to fly. I wouldn’t trust it, though. Either this is alien technology, or your world was a lot more advanced than I’d thought.”
