by Mel Odom
Is this what he was like when he went in search of The Book of Time? Juhg couldn’t help but wonder. And if it is, does this mean that he’s reverting to that older self now that the prize is almost in his hand? He swallowed hard, filled with the fear of what was about to happen to the smuggler leader as well as the rest of their little group. He hoped that Hallekk had—or would—at least rescued the Grandmagister. If Craugh truly let his evil nature show, Juhg could only hope that the Grandmagister was clever enough to stop him.
“I … understand,” Dusen whispered, staring in hypnotic fascination at the spider’s poised legs.
“Good.” Craugh laid his staff across his knees and gave every appearance of being totally comfortable. “Tell me how you found this place.”
Talking slowly and with care, Dusen relayed how Moog—one of the smugglers who was now dead and whose body now floated in the dark water below——had followed the little redhaired dweller out of curiosity to the building near the broken bridge. The building had not been nearly as sunken then as it was now. Afterward Moog had shown the building to Dusen, shown how the windows had been filled in against the flooding that occurred when the island it had been built on had sunk beneath the waves.
“Why do you think this building was so preserved?” Craugh asked.
“There was supposed to be a treasure here from the time before Lord Kharrion raised up the goblinkin hordes and nearly took over the world. That has always been the rumor.”
“Was there a treasure?”
“Perhaps. But it was long gone from this place.”
“But enough people believed in it that the building was preserved,” Craugh pointed out.
“I had the story from one of the taletellers in the Quarry District, where the dwarves cut stone from the heart of the earth to construct buildings with. He told me that the dwarves a long time ago spent years sealing up this building and others around it, then pumping it dry.”
“And no treasure was found?”
“A few things. Gold coins. A scattering of gems. Enough so that people knew a treasure had once been held here. Either it was taken when the underwater quakes reaved the island or shortly thereafter, before the sinking became so extensive.”
“Did anyone ever say why only this place was affected?”
According to the story Dusen had heard, the buildings had once been part of the palace courts of Skydevil’s Roost, but the smuggler leader wasn’t sure that place actually existed or was only a tale that had been told so long it had become like truth.
“It was part of the mainland in those days,” Dusen said. “Not an island. That didn’t happen till the Cataclysm when Lord Kharrion destroyed Teldane’s Bounty farther to the south when the Unity armies tried to hold the goblinkin back so they could evacuate people caught between them and the sea. There weren’t enough ships to get all those people to safety. That’s why there are so many bones in this area. They didn’t just come from the people who died here during the sinking of this city. You’ll find a lot of goblinkin bones around here, too.”
Juhg remembered the stories of the battle fought at Teldane’s Bounty. The Unity armies had held as long as they could, staving off the goblinkin hordes while ships ferried the women and children to safer places north and south of the confrontation. Even then, they hadn’t succeeded in saving all of them. Several innocents perished when Lord Kharrion used the spell that broke the mainland and created the Shattered Coast, reaching for miles in all directions from the epicenter. It was the single largest display of magic ever known to have been unleashed. The dwarven warriors, humans, and elves had died in the destruction or the slaughter that took place shortly after.
Then, when it seemed no more evil could be done, Lord Kharrion had strode among the fields of dead and—under a moonsless sky—raised dead goblinkin warriors up, used his magic to wed their decayed flesh and the special clay he had made up with the fear and suffering of the innocents who had been slaughtered. He had called them Boneblights, and everyone who opposed him learned to fear them.
Juhg had seen the loathsome creatures in Greydawn Moors. Nightmares still haunted him, though they had grown smaller in light of everything else he had learned.
“Seadevil’s Roost was destroyed before then,” Craugh said.
“Mayhap. You hear stories both ways.”
“Do you know what Wi—” Craugh caught himself before he spoke the Grandmagister’s name. “What the dweller was searching for?”
Dusen hesitated.
The spider flexed its legs and leaned in closer.
“I don’t know,” Dusen said. “Moog followed the dweller down into the building, but he didn’t follow him into the lower levels.”
“The floor down there isn’t the lowest level?” Craugh asked.
“No. There are two floors beneath it.”
“Flooded?”
“No.”
Juhg knew there had to have been from the description in the Grandmagister’s journal, but he hadn’t had time to take everything in. Still, the lower floor didn’t look like the one the Grandmagister had talked about in the coded journal.
“Those rooms are walled up and protected,” Dusen went on. “When Moog followed the dweller’s path later, he found where the dweller’s wet footprints went to a false wall.”
Juhg’s pulse raced. The Grandmagister had written about the false wall.
“Later, after Moog had told me about this place, I realized we could use it as a hideout. You only had to swim a little ways back then. Now, this whole building lies beneath the sea. Copper pipes run to the surface to bring fresh air into this place. They are so low now that when the water is bestirred they sometimes let in the sea. Soon, we will either have to add onto the pipes or abandon this place.”
“Did the dweller leave with anything?” Craugh asked.
“Not that Moog could see. We went in search of him later but he was already gone.”
“Why did you go after him?”
“Because of the thing I found. I didn’t understand it, but I know it must be worth something. If it is even real.”
“What thing?” Craugh asked.
Following Dusen’s direction, Juhg stopped at the blank eastern wall in the fourth room to the north from the main room. He’d used his compass to find his way. Marks from tools, axes and swords and crowbars, dented the wall in several places.
“Here,” he announced.
The room had once been the private quarters of the baron of Seadevil’s Roost. Remnants of an iron bed and other furniture lay scattered around the room. There were also the bones of the dead, all gathered in a heap where they had evidently rolled after the building had tilted during one of the subsequent settlings.
Here and there, bits of gilt glinted on the woodwork, but for the most part the room was filled with mold and mildew and the wood was rotted and eaten by worms. Small fish and crabs lived in the ankle-deep water that covered the floor.
According to the Grandmagister’s notes in the latter half of his journal, Seadevil’s Roost had once been governed by a human named Gaultanot who had convinced neighboring human communities to pool their resources together—including their ships——till they became a strong trade guild. Gaultanot had ruled as baron of Seadevil’s Roost, and by all accounts he had been a good man.
How then, Juhg couldn’t help wondering again, did Kharrion tempt the baron into holding one of the sections of The Book of Time? And why break up such a thing of power? Was it truly just to outwit Craugh and the others who pursued him? Or was there another reason that couldn’t yet be seen? He sighed. One of the frustrations of having a mind trained to think and consider possibilities was that it couldn’t simply be stopped once engaged.
“Well,” Cobner asked impatiently, “are you gonna open that door or stare a hole in it? I’m thinking that you’re not gonna be able to stare a hole in it. And even if you do, I don’t think you’re going to be able to stare open a hole big enough to let me through.”
He knelt and studied the water in front of the door. Even with the lantern trained on the area, he couldn’t see anything.
“What are ye doin’?” Raisho asked.
“The Grandmagister mentioned that the hallway leading down to the vault room where the section of The Book of Time is held is filled with traps.” Extending his hand along the floor under the water, Juhg concentrated on feeling for suction. If the hidden door was leaking, then the trapdoor had to be leaking as well.
“After all these years?” Jassamyn asked. “Juhg, it’s been a really long time.”
“Most of the traps are already sprung,” Juhg said. “But not this one.” A-ha! He felt the suction he was suspecting, though it was slight and feathery soft, and traced the rectangle with his fingertips. His palm slid across a layer of mud and he felt the straight edges of the trapdoor mirrored in the sediment. “Someone has gone through this one literally. Perhaps one of Dusen’s people.”
“Kind of him not to mention the trap,” Cobner rumbled. “Mayhap I’ll have a brief visit with him on the way out. Leave him a knot on his melon to remember me by.”
Juhg stood, carefully marking the trapdoor in his mind. He was glad the Grandmagister was so thorough. In all eventuality, though, he would have checked the door before going through. The life he’d led exploring legends and myths with the Grandmagister along the mainland had trained him to be careful.
He turned to Jassamyn and held out the lantern. “Can you manage this?”
The elven maid took the lantern and held it steady on the door as she pulled her bow over her shoulder and freed her longsword. The smugglers showed no sign of recovering from the paralysis any time soon, but there was every chance of other things shambling around in the dark.
“The trapdoor once dropped an unwary person down onto a clutch of sharpened stakes,” Juhg said. “The corpses were taken out down in the basement and burned in the fireplace that heated the building.” He straddled the trapdoor. “The hidden door here is spring-loaded.” Placing his hands on the door, he set himself, then shoved.
The door slid back slowly and Juhg had to lean into it harder. Before he could get it to lock back in position, the trapdoor between his feet popped open and a dead man floated up out of the dark recesses.
Frightened, repulsed by the agony and fear branded onto the dead man’s rat-gnawed face, Juhg cried out and shoved himself backward. He heard the hidden door click into place even as he fell on his rump and the dead man floated up out of the hole.
“Easy there, scribbler,” Raisho said. “Ain’t nothin’ about that one gonna ’urt ye none.”
Jassamyn had kept the lantern trained on the dead man, stepping slightly in front of Juhg to defend him if necessary.
“Evidently,” Craugh said, “he didn’t know about the trapdoor.”
“Came to a dead end, ’e did,” Raisho commented.
The dead man wore regular clothing and not rat hides. Most of the flesh remained on his bones, but it was going fast.
“’E’s not been dead long.” Raisho stepped forward and picked up an abandoned crowbar covered in wet rust. He hooked the body with the crowbar and pulled it free of the trap. As soon as the obstruction cleared the deadly shaft, the trapdoor closed behind it. Whoever the architects were that had built the trap, they had built it to last. Counterweights grinded in the wall.
Two dead rats floated free of the corpse as it came out of the water.
“Well,” Craugh said, kicking one of the rodents with a big boot and causing it to plop into a nest of its brethren on the other side of the room, “there’s two that didn’t get a free meal.”
“Them being there, drowned like that,” Jassamyn said, “and that dead man being a fairly recent victim, means that the water is new to this part of the building. Could mean the lower two floors are flooded.”
Raisho used the crowbar to loot the dead man. A pouch at his waist held a handful of gold and silver coins.
Grinning at the coins, Raisho said, “’E wasn’t wealthy by any means. The next time we stop at an inn, I’ll be buyin’.”
“Let me see those coins,” Craugh said.
A hurt look filled Raisho’s dark face. “I don’t mind sharin’, but it was me what took the time to loot this man.”
“The coins.” Imperiously, Craugh held out his hand. “By the Old Ones, give you eyes to see and still you are blind.”
Grimacing, Raisho dropped the coins into the wizard’s outstretched hand. “I don’t think there’s enough there to change yer life,” the young sailor stated truculently.
Craugh held the coins up to study them under his lantern. Then he looked at Juhg, who had gotten to his feet, nearly as soaked as he had been after the fierce swim underwater.
“Have a look at these, apprentice.”
Juhg cupped both hands and caught the coins. A quick inspection of them revealed what Craugh had spotted. “They’re Torvassiran coins. Not Imarish.”
Each of the communities along the mainland struck their own coins. Sometimes a successful trade guild or a ship owner with a small fleet did the same. There was no standard between the nations and the cities of the mainland. Gold and silver were minted, and they were all checked for weight on the scales of every marketplace where they were spent.
“Exactly.” Craugh glared at the dead man. “This man came a long way to die.”
Torvassir lay to the east, far inland where the trade caravans met. It wasn’t too unusual to think that the man had come from Torvassir, but since he had few other coins mixed in, he’d come from there almost straightaway and hadn’t mixed much with the locals. That kind of behavior was curious.
During his travels with the Grandmagister, Juhg had twice been through Torvassir, finding the city a comfortable place to be. A consortium of merchants ran Torvassir and provided for the city’s defense. Several of them had interests in history, as Juhg had found out while journeying with the Grandmagister. During that time, the Grandmagister had searched for two books that one of the merchants had purchased. Fleeing Torvassir later, after they’d successfully stolen the books witch Brandt’s help, they had been pursued for days before finally eluding them.
“I ’ave something else as well,” Raisho announced. He ripped open the dead man’s inside coat pocket and took out a waterproof oilskin pouch.
The familiar rectangular shape set Juhg’s heart to pounding at once. The shape could have belonged to anything, but he only imagined one. He crossed over to the young sailor and offered the coins in exchange for the oilskin pouch.
Raisho gratefully made the exchange, dumping the coins into his own coin pouch, then tucking it away inside his shirt.
Excitedly, no longer paying much attention to the dead man, Juhg opened the oilskin pouch. Inside was a handmade book.
He took the book from the pouch. It was smooth and clean and unadorned, obviously something that had been well cared for. But the pages swelled with writing, having to be tied shut with a bright blue ribbon.
Opening the book, Juhg found a simple declaration: The Journal of Liggon Phares, Being an Account of My Travels and Discoveries. Hypnotized by the find, still not believing what he was looking at, Juhg flipped through the pages.
“What have you got there, apprentice?” Craugh asked.
“A journal,” Juhg whispered in awe. The pages revealed a good writing hand and several diagrams that he quickly recognized as Skull Canal and the building they were currently in. The Book of Time was mentioned (and heavily underlined) on a number of pages. The language was one of the human ones, and one that Juhg could read, though not without considerable effort.
“A journal?” Craugh stepped closer.
“Yes,” Juhg replied. “This man’s journal. He came here looking for The Book of Time as well.”
Arms folded over his chest, Cobner glared down a
t the dead man. “Mayhap this quest ain’t any too healthy.”
“He came here alone?” Craugh asked.
“I don’t know.” Halfway through the book, Juhg came to an end of the narrative. It was dated, as the Kashaller human traders counted days, no more than three ten-days ago.
Cobner suggested they open up the trapdoor and look for the dead man’s companions. No one took him up on it.
“A mystery better saved for a more convenient time, apprentice,” Craugh said. “For the moment, let’s turn our attentions to the matter at hand.”
Regretfully, Juhg closed the book and replaced it into the oilskin pouch, which he tied tightly. He shoved the book inside his jacket where he carried his own journal and the Grandmagister’s coded one. If this keeps up, he thought wryly, I will soon be carrying a Library around with me.
Returning his attentions to the hidden door, he once more straddled the trapdoor and placed his hands on the surface of the door. Knowing the door had clicked back into the secondary ready position, he shoved it sideways. At first he didn’t think he was going to be strong enough to move it, then the door grudgingly got underway.
The light from the lantern Jassamyn held speared into the dark throat of the hallway on the other side of the door.
Juhg had expected the water swirling around his ankles to slide down the long hallway ahead of him. Instead, it splashed a little, but stayed level.
The hallway was flooded with sea water.
Jassamyn pressed forward. The draca on her shoulder hissed and spat, obviously afraid that she was contemplating entering the water.
The lantern light penetrated the hallway, following the curving descent till the sea filled it. Fifteen feet down, the stairway was completely submerged.
“Everything below is filled with water,” the elven maid said. “Whatever is down there must be ruined.”
“Not The Book of Time,” Craugh said. “It’s magical. The elements can’t harm it. Only another, more powerful spell can unweave it. And since it came from the In-Betweenness, magic to do that might not exist in this place.” He took a deep breath in through his nose and let it out. “If it’s down there, it’s in one piece.”
