[Fablehaven 02] - Rise of the Evening Star

by Brandon Mull - (ebook by Undead)

  “That might do him good,” Warren said. He uncapped the bottle, propped up Seth’s head, and poured some of the fluid into his mouth. Seth spluttered and coughed. After a moment, Warren gave him more, which he gulped.

  Seth’s eyes opened, and his brow furrowed. “You!” he said weakly, his voice raspy.

  “Get out of him, hag,” Warren spat.

  Seth smiled eerily. And then his eyes rolled white. “What happened?” he gasped, voice still raspy. “The revenant?”

  “You succeeded,” Warren said.

  “You’re healed,” Seth murmured perplexedly, staring at Warren. “Didn’t know… that would happen. Kendra. You came.”

  “Ask him something only he would know,” Warren said. “This could be a ruse.”

  Kendra thought for a moment. “What dessert did you hate in your school lunch last year?”

  “Cherry cobbler,” Seth said weakly.

  “What was your favorite shadow puppet Dad used to make?”

  “Chicken,” he said.

  “It’s him,” Kendra said confidently.

  “Can you sit up?” Warren asked.

  Seth’s head bobbed slightly forward. His fingers twitched. “I feel like I’ve been run over by a steamroller. Like everything… has been squished out of me. My throat hurts.”

  “He needs time to recuperate,” Warren said. “And I need to get into the tower. The narcoblix knows the way is open. The only reason she would have released Seth is because she is already on her way here. Kendra, you mentioned that a great imp is helping her, along with another man, but she may have more contacts than them on the preserve. I should be able to navigate the traps. Let’s have Mendigo take you and your brother to a safe place.”

  “I want to come,” Seth croaked.

  “You’ve done enough today,” Warren said. “Time to pass off the torch to others.”

  “Give me more of that potion,” Seth said.

  “More of that potion won’t change your condition,” Warren said. “Though Kendra should probably have a dose, to help her keep awake.”

  Kendra took a sip. Almost instantly she felt a burst of alertness, as if she had been slapped.

  Warren scooped his arms under Seth, lifting him in a cradled position. Kendra started collecting the key and the ax, but Warren told her to leave them. He was walking with quick steps back toward Mendigo.

  “Should I go into the tower with you, Warren?” she asked, catching up.

  “Too dangerous,” he said.

  “I may be able to help,” she said. “Last year, I visited the Fairy Queen’s shrine on the island in the pond and raised a fairy army to save Fablehaven from a demon named Bahumat.”

  “What?” Warren sputtered.

  “She did,” Seth confirmed.

  “You do have stories!” Warren said.

  “The fairies left me with certain gifts,” Kendra continued, not wanting to specify that she was fairykind. “I can see in the dark, and speak all the languages the fairies can. I don’t need the milk anymore to see magical creatures. And my touch can recharge magical objects that are out of energy. The Sphinx seemed to think that might come in handy for some of the artifacts.”

  “It very well might,” Warren said. “It has been suggested that the artifacts were deliberately drained of energy as an additional safeguard.”

  “Without me you might not be able to use the artifact even if you find it,” Kendra said.

  “I believe I can successfully negotiate the traps in the tower,” Warren said. “But that is without knowing what they are. I’m not infallible, as the grove has aptly proven. Do you understand the possible dangers of accompanying me?”

  “We could both die,” Kendra said. “But there is danger everywhere at Fablehaven today. I’ll come with you.”

  “An extra pair of eyes and hands could make a difference,” Warren conceded. “And the ability to charge the artifact, whichever one it is, could make all the difference. We’ll trust Mendigo to watch over Seth.”

  “This is no fair,” Seth muttered.

  “Do you want your glove back?” Kendra asked.

  “You’ll need it more,” he said firmly.

  They emerged from the grove and hurried to Mendigo. Warren suggested that Kendra have Mendigo take Seth to the stables. Kendra gave orders for Mendigo to take Seth to the stables and watch over him, keep him safe from harm, and not allow him to wander off for a full day unless otherwise instructed. Mendigo trotted away, cradling Seth.

  Warren and Kendra ran back to the dry skeleton of the revenant and retrieved the key and the ax. Kendra followed Warren deeper into the grove. There was little undergrowth, but the deeper they went, the closer the trees grew together, and the heavier they were draped with moss and mistletoe. They reached a place where the trees grew so snugly that their branches interlocked in such a way as to almost form a wall.

  When Warren shouldered through the living barrier, they found a small clearing ringed by trees, illuminated by a warm, predawn glow. A sizable raised platform of reddish stone dominated the area, looking almost like an outdoor stage. Stone stairs on one side of the platform granted easy access.

  Up the steps Warren charged, with Kendra at his heels. Despite the ubiquitous wildflowers and weeds in the clearing, the stone platform was untouched by vegetation. The smooth surface was flecked with black and gold. At the center of the spacious platform was a round socket, surrounded by multiple circular grooves that radiated out concentrically to the edge of the platform. About four feet separated each of the dark, narrow grooves. From above, the grooves would look like a target, with the socket at the center of the bull’s-eye.

  Warren placed the complicated end of the key into the round socket. He had to twist the key back and forth, lining up various protuberances with notches in the socket to gradually work it in deeper. Once the tall key was approximately a foot into the hole, it clicked home.

  “You sure you’re up for this?” Warren asked. “There will be no turning back once we go inside.”

  “What do you mean?” Kendra asked.

  “These sorts of places are designed so that unless you make it to the end and claim your prize, you do not make it out alive. The designers don’t want explorers solving the puzzle piece by piece. The traps guarding the way back will be much less forgiving than the traps protecting the way forward. Until we reach the artifact.”

  “I’m coming,” Kendra said.

  Face reddening with exertion, Warren gripped the handle of the key tightly and began turning it. The key rotated 180 degrees and stopped.

  The platform shuddered. It became apparent that the circular grooves marked divisions between concentric rings of stone when the outer ring fell away into darkness, followed by the next, and the next, and the next. The massive rings thundered as they struck the ground.

  Warren pulled Kendra near him, standing atop the innermost circle with the key. Though the other rings all fell, the innermost never dropped. Peering down, Kendra saw that the outermost ring had fallen the farthest, with each ring thereafter plummeting a shorter distance, so that all together they formed a conical stairway. From the outside of the platform, it was at least a thirty-foot drop to the floor of the chamber. From the center where Kendra and Warren stood, the next ring was only four feet lower, the next four feet lower again, and so forth down to the floor.

  “They just don’t build entrances like they used to,” Warren said. He tugged on the key, and, with a musical ring of steel, the portion of the key in the socket separated from the rest of it. Now instead of ending in a complicated series of protuberances and notches, the key ended in a slender, double-edged spearhead. “Would you look at that?”

  “Can’t be good,” Kendra said.

  “Yeah, it probably turns into a weapon for a reason,” Warren said, looking down into the chamber. “I don’t see any trouble yet.”

  “I’m putting on the glove,” Kendra said. She vanished.

  “Not bad,” Warren said.
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  Kendra waved at him, reappearing as she moved. “It only works when I hold still.”

  “Do you know what any of the potions do?” Warren asked.

  “I know a couple that would make us about eight or nine inches tall,” she said. “And I know some are bottled-up emotions, although I’m not sure which is which. Seth might know a few others. We should have asked him.”

  Warren began climbing down from ring to ring. “As a last resort, you can always try a random potion,” he said. “Hopefully it won’t come to that.”

  The chamber was not much larger than the widest ring of stone. The floor appeared to be a single slab of bedrock. There was nothing in the chamber except a pair of doors at opposite ends. One wall was covered in writings in various languages, including a few repeated messages in English.

  This accursed sanctum lies

  outside the domain of Fablehaven.

  Do not proceed.

  Go in peace.

  Kendra assumed the other messages restated the same thing in their respective languages.

  “Why did they write it in English so many times?” Kendra asked.

  “I only see it in English once,” Warren said.

  “Oh, fairy languages,” she said.

  They reached the bottom ring. “Stay near me,” Warren instructed. “Step only where I step. Be ready for anything.” He tapped the ground with the handle of the key before stepping down. Kendra followed him.

  “Which door should we try?” Kendra asked.

  “You pick,” he said. “It’s a toss-up.”

  Kendra pointed at one of the doors. Warren led the way, prodding the floor with the key like a blind man. The door was of plain, heavy wood bound in iron, and appeared to be in good repair. Warren probed the ground off to one side and had Kendra stand there holding the ax. Standing still, she disappeared. Holding the key like a spear, he pulled the door open.

  Nothing waited behind the door except a stairway curling downward. Warren got out the dying flashlight. He tried to tap the top stair with the handle of the key, but the handle went right through it.

  “Kendra, look,” Warren said. The handle of the key disappeared through the first few steps. “False stairs. Probably masking a drop of hundreds of feet.”

  They crossed the room and repeated their cautious actions at the other door. Again the door opened to a stairway, and again the stairs were only an illusion. Warren leaned out far, testing with the key, to check if perhaps only the first few stairs were counterfeit, but nothing within reach proved to be tangible.

  Warren led the way around the perimeter of the room, tapping the floor and the walls. They reached a place where the key passed through the wall. Warren leaned through the illusion, and Kendra heard him tapping with the key.

  “Here is the genuine stairway,” he said. Kendra passed through the insubstantial wall and saw a stone stairway winding downward. White stones set in the walls emitted a soft light.

  “You never know what might be a mirage in places like this,” Warren said. He poked one of the glowing stones with the key. “Ever seen a sunstone?”

  “No,” Kendra said.

  “So long as one stone sits under the sun, all the sister stones share the light,” he said. “It’s probably atop one of the nearby hills.”

  As they descended the stairs, they found a few places where illusionary steps disguised gaps in the stairway. Warren helped Kendra leap across the empty places. Finally they reached the bottom of the stairs and another door.

  Again Warren had Kendra move over to one side as he opened the door. “Strange,” he murmured, testing the ground. Warren stepped through the doorway. “Come on, Kendra.”

  She peeked through the doorway. The room was large and circular, with a domed ceiling. White stones set in the ceiling illuminated the scene. Deep, golden sand covered the floor. On the far side of the room a door was painted on the wall. On the left side of the room murals of three monsters decorated the wall, with another three on the right side. Kendra saw a blue woman with six arms and the body of a serpent, a Minotaur, a huge Cyclops, a dark man who from waist up looked human and from waist down had the body and legs of a spider, an armored snakelike man wearing an elaborate headdress, and a dwarf in a hooded cloak. All the images, though a tad faded, had been rendered with supreme skill.

  Warren raised a hand for Kendra to halt. The key sank into the sand in front of him. “There are places where the sand becomes treacherous,” he said. “Watch your step.”

  In order to avoid sinking in quicksand, they took a circuitous path to the painted door on the far side of the room. The painting depicted a door of solid iron with a keyhole below the handle. Hesitantly, Warren touched the painting. The image of the door rippled for an instant, and suddenly the door became real, a mural no longer.

  Warren whirled, key held high, and eyed the other murals in the room. Nothing happened. Finally he turned back to the door and tried the handle. The door was locked. “Notice anything all the creatures on the wall have in common?” Warren asked.

  Kendra focused on comparing them. “A key around their necks,” she said. The keys were not obvious. They were small, and subtly drawn, but each painted being had one.

  “Any theories on how we get through the door?” Warren asked, obviously with an answer in mind.

  “You’ve got to be kidding,” Kendra said.

  “Don’t we both wish,” he said. “The old guys who designed this place sure knew how to throw a party.” He led Kendra around the perimeter of the room, avoiding quicksand, and scrutinized the depiction of each individual creature.

  “The keys appear identical to me,” he said after studying the dwarf. “I think the game is selecting which foe we believe we can overcome.”

  “I hate to be cruel,” Kendra said, “but I’m thinking the dwarf.”

  “I would choose him last of all,” Warren said. “He carries no weapon, which leads me to believe he must be strong in magic. And he looks the easiest at first glance, which almost certainly means he is the most deadly.”

  “Then who?” Kendra asked. The Minotaur carried a heavy mace. The Cyclops wielded a cudgel. The blue woman held a sword in each hand. The hobgoblin, as Warren had named the snakelike man, clutched a pair of axes. And the half-spider man bore a javelin and a whip.

  “I suspect the Minotaur may be the lesser of these evils,” Warren said at length. “I would no sooner choose the woman than the dwarf, and a Cyclops is nearly as adroit as he is strong. Of the others, the Minotaur carries the most cumbersome weapon. His mace will limit his reach and hamper his ability to avoid the tip of my spear.”

  “You mean your key,” Kendra said.

  “We’ll use one key to get another.”

  Kendra regarded the Minotaur. Black fur, wide horns, bulky musculature. He stood a full head taller than Warren. “You think you can take him?” Kendra asked.

  Warren was testing the sand and outlining the sinkholes.

  “I’ll want you to stand still,” he said. “The Minotaur may catch your scent — I want to keep him in doubt as to your location. You’ll keep the ax, and if I should lose the key, you may be able to toss it to me. If I should fall, the Minotaur will roam the room searching for you. If you keep still, you may have one free swing at him.”

  “But you think you can take him?” Kendra repeated.

  Warren looked at the image of the Minotaur and hefted the key. “Why not? I’ve made it through some tight scrapes before. I would give a lot for a few of my regular weapons. Maybe you could use the ax to help me mark all the quicksand?”

  They spent much longer than Kendra liked delineating the areas of treacherous sand. She knew Vanessa and Errol were on their trail. Once the sand had been marked, Warren positioned Kendra so that the largest region of quicksand was between her and the Minotaur. He approached the mural.

  “You ready?” Warren asked.

  “I guess,” Kendra answered, squeezing the handle of her invisible ax, her heart
pounding.

  “Maybe I can get in a cheap shot right at the start,” he said, touching the image of the Minotaur and raising the key, holding it ready to strike. The mural wavered for a moment and then vanished. The sharp tip of the key clinked against the wall, and the Minotaur appeared behind Warren.

  “Behind you!” Kendra screamed.

  Warren ducked and lunged to the side, narrowly avoiding a blow that would have brained him. The Minotaur swung the mace briskly. The weapon was big and heavy, but the Minotaur was strong enough that it did not look very cumbersome.

  Warren faced the Minotaur, staying a few paces away, key held ready. “Why not just hand over the key?” Warren asked. The Minotaur snorted. From across the room, Kendra could smell the beast, an odor like livestock.

  The Minotaur charged, and Warren nimbly danced away. Warren pulled back his arm as if to throw the key, and the Minotaur raised his mace protectively. Feinting like he was hurling the key, Warren leapt closer and used the long reach of the key to scratch the Minotaur on the snout.

  The Minotaur roared, chasing Warren around the room. Warren ran from his pursuer, trying his best to lead the Minotaur toward quicksand while keeping the beast away from Kendra. Either the Minotaur understood what the lines in the sand meant, or he instinctively knew where not to step, because he skirted the quicksand just as effectively as Warren.

  Sniffing the air, the Minotaur turned toward Kendra. “Over here, you coward!” Warren shouted, moving in closer and brandishing the key. The Minotaur strode boldly toward Warren, holding the mace off to one side, tempting Warren by leaving his chest exposed.

  After a few feints, Warren took the bait, driving the tip of the key toward the Minotaur’s chest. The Minotaur grabbed the key just below the slender spearhead with his free hand and wrenched it from Warren’s grasp, yanking him closer in the process, and swung the mace.

  Warren saved himself by diving backwards and managing to keep his feet. The blow had missed by inches. The Minotaur quickly reversed his grip on the key and hurled it like a javelin, burying the head in Warren’s abdomen despite his attempt to dodge it.