“Perhaps we could just agree that getting yourself killed is not going to help anyone, even if it is the most honorable thing to do,” said Ivy, returning to the point that she had wanted to make.
“I will attempt no action that would endanger any of you,” promised Sanval, replacing his helmet very slowly and very straight upon his head.
Only Ivy seemed to notice that he made no promises about his personal safety.
CHAPTER THIRTEEN
Once he was done with his book, Archlis neatly packed it away into a pouch dangling from his belt. Kid watched him from behind Ivy’s back.
“So he still has it.” Kid’s voice was soft, just loud enough for her to hear.
“What?”
“Toram’s book.”
“And who was Toram?”
“A bad man. An evil man.” Ivy had never heard Kid, whose own morality was rather questionable, state his disapproval so flatly. “But a learned one. He spent his life robbing the secrets of others.”
“So are there maps in that book?” The tunnels were twisting round and round. As good as Mumchance’s sense of direction was underground, Ivy would have loved to have a map that showed clearly where they were in Tsurlagol’s ruins and, more importantly, where they could get out of Tsurlagol’s ruins. “Could you steal it?’
Kid fingered the knives beneath his collar. “He has charms to protect him against theft,” he reluctantly whispered. “He would have to be distracted and even then … I am sorry, my dear, I do not know if I can do it.”
Ivy gave one of his horns a friendly pull. “Don’t worry. There’s bound to be some other way to get out of here. I have a plan or two in my back pocket.”
“For just such an emergency,” Kid said, looking more cheerful. “Well, I will watch and wait for my chance. For I do not like that man, my dear.” And he continued to watch the magelord’s back, fingering his knives in a thoughtful way.
Marching two by two through increasingly narrow tunnels, the group followed Archlis. The magelord strode in front, periodically lighting a finger the way another man would light a candle so he could better see some arcane symbol etched in the walls. He never hesitated, although they passed a myriad of tunnels branching away into the darkness. Of course, Archlis had come this way once before. Still Ivy had to admire a man who remembered directions after having dealt with and avoided some of the most devious traps of place.
One bugbear walked in front of them, and another walked behind them. So far there had been no opportunity for escape.
“We’ve turned east again,” Mumchance said with the certainty of an elderly dwarf far underground. Wiggles once again rode in his pocket, sleeping off her late lunch. Everyone had slipped her part of their bread because she had looked so sad and hungry. Now the dog was so full, she could barely waddle.
“Back toward the city? The city wall that we want?” Ivy asked.
“Closer than we were.” Mumchance fingered his fake eye. “We could still use our little treasure against them.”
“And kill whom? The one in front or the one in back?” hissed Ivy. “You can’t get them all.” She turned back to her wizard, the one that couldn’t light fires but could definitely feel water. “Where’s the river?”
“Still running strong behind us,” Gunderal whispered. “I can feel it flooding the tunnels.”
“There is something else too. Something old and magical behind us,” said Kid, one ear swiveling forward and one back.
“Oh, do you feel it too?” A relieved Gunderal bent down and gave him a quick hug. “I could not figure out what I was smelling, and it was giving me such a headache—I thought it might be a reaction to my own spell.”
“What are you talking about, sister?” asked Zuzzara. “Are you ill?”
“I’m fine. But whatever the magic is, it is giving me such an itch in my nose. I feel like I’m going to sneeze, but I can’t. It’s driving me crazy.”
Zuzzara pulled a large silk handkerchief out of her waistcoat pocket. “Blow.”
Gunderal blew, delicately of course, and sighed. “Oh, that’s better. I felt my ears pop.”
Ivy chewed her lower lip and thought about a possible magical threat following them. Well, it was not treading on her heels like the bugbear, so she decided to ignore it for now.
“If we are heading back toward Tsurlagol,” said Zuzzara, who was always the most optimistic of the Siegebreakers (as long as her sisters Mimeri and Gunderal were happy), “then maybe we can find our wall again. The one that we are supposed to knock down.”
“The Thultyrl gave us two days,” Ivy said. “And I don’t think that we have even finished out half of the first day.” She thought about the number of fights, wrong turns, and other disasters that had befallen them. “Well, maybe more than half.”
Sanval answered softly, “The Thultyrl may not wait. I did not go back to the camp. They would have investigated and found your tunnel collapsed.”
“And presume that we are dead?”
“Or unable to complete your task.”
“What will they do then?” Ivy asked.
“Charge the wall without your help.”
“Wonderful thought.” Now she had to worry about an entire troop of Procampur’s finest trying to scale the western wall and overrun Fottergrim’s orcs in the holdings at the top. Even without Archlis opposing them with his fire spells, it would not take much to turn the charge into a rout.
“Well, this looks like trouble,” said Ivy.
A pair of oaken doors blocked the way. The lock had been burned open, and the blasted doors hung half off their hinges.
“Waste of magic,” Mumchance said when he saw the condition of the doors.
“He has magic to waste, dear sir,” replied Kid with a significant wink toward Archlis. The magelord stood behind them, flanked by his bugbears, and was obviously waiting for them to survey the room beyond.
Peeking through the ruined doors, they could see a corridor with a checkered floor made from huge stone slabs. Some had a fine cross-hatch pattern cut into them. Others were marked with a spiral of stars, and still others with wavy lines. A few squares were polished smooth and blank.
“Earth, sky, ocean,” said Mumchance. “And that which we find on the other side of death.”
“Nothing,” said Ivy, because this was an old lesson, one that her mother had taught when she had taken Ivy hunting for treasure in the wild. She had seen such patterns in ruins before. They invariably led to a tomb or crypt. “It’s a path to the dead.”
“A bit more dead than usual, my dears,” pointed out Kid. For the floor was littered with the bodies of hobgoblins and orcs, a ragged and rather squashed looking troop. Their lifeless, muscular bodies were limp, their blank yellow eyes staring at nothing, their hide and rough hair poking out from breaks in their once bright armor. Shields were as flat as plates, and swords smashed.
“More of Fottergrim’s?” asked Ivy.
“They pursued us through this section,” said Archlis, “but they did not know the secret of the squares. The ceiling crushed them as it does anyone who does not know the pattern.”
At this pronouncement, they all glanced up. The ceiling was low and gleamed with a spectral light, clearly showing a lattice of iron suspended above the floor. A long pointed spike was welded to the corner of each tiny square formed by the ironwork. Some of the spikes were clearly blunted by repeated poundings on the stone floor below. Others still dripped with bits and pieces of the unfortunates who had passed below without the knowledge of the floor’s pattern. Chains ran from the lattice into square holes cut into the stone ceiling above.
“The floor is constructed in such a way that if four people move across the squares in unison, the trap stays in the ceiling. Should one make a misstep, the trap comes crashing down. I have the pattern here,” Archlis withdrew his spellbook from his pouch and unfolded a page twice as large as the book from its center. The parchment was blotched with terrible stains, but a series of gra
y-brown lines and rust red symbols could be seen on one side.
“You and you,” said Archlis, pointing at Sanval and Zuzzara, “should go first, as you appear to be about the same weight. Then”—he nodded toward Ivy and Mumchance—“you will follow. You must step exactly as I say.”
“And then what?” asked Ivy.
Archlis pointed with the head of his Ankh to the doors visible at the opposite end of the room. “There is a lever on the left-hand side. Turn it three times to the right. The lock handle must be turned delicately and correctly, but if done right, the trap will remain locked long enough for the rest of us to cross.”
“Then it resets itself?” asked Mumchance.
“Yes. There is no way to lock it open permanently. But it takes some time for it to reset. After we had left this room, Fottergrim’s trackers were able to cross it safely when they followed us. We eluded them in the maze that it is beyond those doors, but were forced back. We locked the trap from that side when we crossed the room again so more than half the trackers escaped with their lives and continued to hunt us into the room where you found us.”
“So when the ceiling comes down, it comes down fast,” said Mumchance with a speculative note in his voice. “And it probably goes up very slowly.”
“Whether it is fast or slow does not matter. I hold the pattern here. We used it to cross once before. Once you have reached the other side, the dwarf will turn the lock and secure the room as I have instructed. That should be within his skills,” said Archlis. Mumchance snorted. “Then we will follow you,” continued Archlis. “Now take one step right, one step forward, and one step left, and repeat that pattern until you reach the other side.”
“It sounds like a court dance,” said Sanval, readying himself to cross by the usual straightening of his helmet and a quick check of his weapons.
Ivy looked across the room and at the corpses that littered many of the squares. She laid one hand on Sanval’s arm to keep him from stepping out. “But there are extra bodies on the floor, and that will make it harder. Hate to trip over someone else’s feet as we glide along.”
“Or someone’s severed head, more likely,” said Mumchance, eyeing the carnage.
“Can we do it?” questioned Zuzzara. “If one is off count or stumbles …”
“All of us die,” said Ivy, turning to Archlis. “I don’t like this.”
The magelord adjusted his grip on his Ankh, one rusty ring on his hand grating unpleasantly against its smooth metal surface. “If you refuse, you will die faster. Then the others can choose which danger is greater—the floor ahead or myself. I only need four to cross and turn the key.”
“If he is so clever, why can’t he break the trap’s spell?” Gunderal whispered.
“It is not a spell,” Kid whispered back. “Do you feel any magic here?”
Gunderal’s pretty face smoothed into that look of perfect serenity that meant she was feeling along the Weave of magical forces. She slowly shook her head.
Mumchance nodded in agreement with Kid. “It’s all mechanical.”
Ivy backed away from Archlis, fingering the hilt of her sword. Sanval also had a firm grip on his weapon. Archlis did not look worried, which was worrisome. The bugbears were a bit too relaxed as well, just leaning on their glaives and watching with interest. They obviously felt no threat.
“Waste of time,” said Mumchance, who had been studying the floor and then the ceiling while carrying on a whispered conversation with Kid. He squinted at the little thief, who nodded very firmly this time. “All that hopping back and forth. Kid, get ready. Come up here, Zuzzara.”
“No,” said Archlis, “it must be two of almost equal weight who start the pattern.”
“Don’t care about the pattern.” Mumchance scratched Wiggles’s head as he contemplated the room. “Zuzzara, how far can you throw a dead hobgoblin?”
“Same as a live one,” she said with grin. “Halfway across the room without much trouble.”
“Should work. Let’s get you a little help. Hey, you, big guy,” Mumchance said, crooking a finger at the nearest bugbear. “Hook me a hobgoblin with that stick of yours. The little one near the door will work fine. He’s almost intact.”
The bugbear growled at Mumchance, but he went to the threshold of the room. The hairs on the back of the bugbear’s neck were clearly visible just below the line of his battered helmet and just as clearly standing straight out. The bugbear muttered and grumbled, very softly in the back of his throat, as he looked beyond the room to the doors on the far side. Still, he obeyed Mumchance’s orders, ignoring the scowling magelord. The bugbear leaned through the doors, carefully keeping his feet out of the room and off the carved pavement. He thrust his glaive into the nearest hobgoblin and dragged it back through the door.
“You get one end. Zuzzara, you grab the other,” instructed Mumchance. “Kid, get ready to jump.”
Kid crouched in the center of the door. Zuzzara and the bugbear swung the body twice and then sent it sailing over Kid’s head and into the room. It fell heavily on the tiles. With a screeching of gears above the ceiling, then the clash of unwinding chains, the ironwork grid dropped from above them and crashed to the floor, again impaling the dead hobgoblins and orcs.
“Go! Go!” shouted Mumchance at Kid.
Kid leaped lightly on top of the ironwork and raced across the grid. A ponderous tick-tick of gears sounded in the ceiling. “It’s starting up again,” yelled Mumchance. Kid spurted ahead and dropped in front of the doors. He grasped the lever and twisted it savagely around to the right. There was a grinding noise that came from the ceiling and then a distinct sproing sounded through the room. The spiked grid remained where it had landed on the floor.
“See,” said Mumchance, hoisting himself on top of the ironwork and strolling straight across. “Much easier to break it than to go dancing across the floor.”
If the magelord was pleased, it did not show in his scowl. The bugbears looked on, expressionless, but then Ivy did not expect any sort of expression on a bugbear’s squashed furry face.
When they reached the far side of the room, Ivy said to the dwarf, “That was just too easy. What terrible thing happens next, do you suppose?”
“Look, these old tomb builders weren’t exactly mechanical geniuses,” said Mumchance. “Well, one or two were good at it, and the others just copied them. I would bet you a good night’s sleep that the gears are rusted out, the chains have weak links, and a couple more drops would have broken the whole thing. But the most delicate gears are always in the lock mechanism. The magelord was right. It’s all about balance and counterbalance, the right pressure at the right time. Archlis had already forced it open twice today, so it was sure to be a bit bunged up.”
“And if the ironwork went back into place while Kid was racing across?”
“Wouldn’t move that fast. Archlis said there was enough time for a bunch of Fottergrim’s raiders to follow him through and out once already, which meant some type of gear rotating in the lock and, most likely, the same sort of gear powering the resetting of the trap. Of course, if there had been any magic behind it, that would have been different, but Gunderal didn’t smell anything. But, Ivy, that’s all done and in the past. You should be worrying about something else.”
“What?”
“Whatever chased them back into this room. You heard the magelord. They went through once, doing that hop-jump-hop across the floor. Fottergrim’s hounds followed them and then something forced Archlis back across that room one more time. It wasn’t those hobgoblins and orcs. He roasted them as soon as they caught up to him.”
The dwarf had a point. Ivy just hated that. A magelord unhindered by hobgoblins and unflustered by stray warriors appearing in the middle of his battles (even if those warriors were a battered troupe like Ivy’s) would only retreat from something very large and fairly fireproof. And deadly. She doubted that anything short of deadly would stop him. What came next must be far more dangerous than Fottergri
m’s fighters.
“I knew this was too easy,” said a rueful Ivy. Staying next to Mumchance, she squeezed to one side to let Zuzzara, Gunderal, and Sanval pass into the corridor beyond. Archlis and his bugbears followed. “Well, at least we got through that trap with minimum fuss.”
Kid sidled next to her, stamping from hoof to hoof.
“Those early tomb builders lacked sophistication.” Mumchance poked at the broken mechanism that locked the trap into place, wiggling the long brass handle that disappeared into a square hole carved into the stone. Like any dwarf, he never could resist trying to pull something apart just to see how it worked. Ivy almost expected him to pry the mechanism out of the wall, just so he could examine it later. “Not like today. If I had built that bit back there, there would be some secondary trap or …”
Ivy never heard the rest of the sentence. The stone slab under her feet slid open with a sharp click and the rattle of chains running through a stone channel. She and Kid dropped into the darkness below. As she was falling, she caught a brief glimpse of Mumchance’s surprised face, his mouth still open, before the stone trapdoor snapped shut above her.
CHAPTER FOURTEEN
The day after a fifteen-year-old Ivy had been dug out from under a dead horse by a kindly dwarf, she had wanted to stop at the nearest temple and make a few offerings.
Mumchance had dissuaded her.
“I wouldn’t,” he had said. “Over the last three hundred years, the one thing that I have learned is that it is best to ignore the gods. Take no notice of them, and they will take no notice of you.”
It had seemed like good advice at the time. Now Ivy wondered if she had angered some god somewhere. Nothing else could account for her foul luck.
She sat up slowly in the darkness beneath the trapdoor, unsure which parts of her body still worked after her fall. Her ribs ached, her back hurt, and the rubble covering the floor was making itself felt through the leather of her breeches. But none of the pains felt fatal, just more bruises on top of the bruises collected in her earlier falls that day, not to mention the buffeting by kobolds, the squeezing of that snake, and—oh now she remembered—a few well-placed blows from the hobgoblins. Once she was free of this tangle of tunnels and traps, Ivy intended to march herself to the largest, most impressive healer’s tent that she could find, lie down, and not get up again until every single cut, bruise, and kink in her muscles had been soothed away by some skilled healing hands. Some heroes might go to their temples to give thanks for salvation. Others might drink themselves blind in a victory party, and still others might pursue a new amorous alliance. From nauseous experience, Ivy had learned to avoid long drinking bouts, as they led to more physical misery. She did have a few ideas for possible lusty activities, and she most certainly planned to rethink her opposition to giving thanks in temples (although she supposed she would have to decide what god or goddess would be willing to overlook her long lapse in abstinence from worship). But at this moment, she needed to give herself some special promise to lure herself into standing up.
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