by Welcome Cole
“No,” he whispered to himself, “Don’t react! Look. Think. Deduce.”
He looked toward the channel that undoubtedly led deeper into the fetid sewer. It would lead him out eventually, he was sure of it. The question was, at what price? Would the foul ethers emitted by the waste eventually consume him? Would they compromise his body’s own natural balance and infect him with some hideous disease? Cholera, maybe? The plague?
He wasn’t afraid of the other side of life, but the image of his incorporeal essence drifting aimlessly through these interminable catacombs, forever lost, forever in a state of abject terror was too much to bear. He seized his face and pushed back the tears.
Yet, as he fought against his despair, he saw the truth. Dead was dead, and the means wouldn’t matter one second after the fact. He’d either escape or he wouldn’t. The arrow and runes were the first signs he’d been given, and he’d be mad to ignore them.
As he climbed up into the ascending passage, the breeze notched higher. His confidence swelled. He suddenly understood that he was indeed going to escape this misery. He was going to live!
The revelation was too much. He collapsed into the stone and sobbed. He cried until he couldn’t breathe, until he had no strength left to continue.
And as he laid there on the cold, unforgiving stone, he made a vow. When he walked out on the other side of this hell, he’d never take another day for granted, never eat another bite or take another breath without thanking every ruling deity above them. When he eventually walked out of this pit, he’d do so as a man reborn. He’d dedicate his life and his powers as a fledgling mage to do well for the world. Maybe he’d go to Parhron and join a priory, or work to heal the poor and downtrodden in the Nolands. Whatever he did was going to be big enough to demand the attention of Calina and all the Gods of Pentyrfal.
∞
Luren swam up from the chill depths of sleep into the colder waters of consciousness. He pushed himself up from the damp granite. He’d been crawling up this interminable incline for hours now. Lashes crusted shut by dried ooze caged his eyes closed. It was several horrifying minutes before he finally managed up enough saliva to work them open.
At first, he thought the light dancing in his vision was born of the ethereal sparks that came of rubbing his eyes too hard. But he quickly realized the truth of it, and as he did, his heart rushed into his throat.
He rolled to his knees, knocking his skull against the low ceiling of the tunnel. He grabbed his head and looked toward the light. He held his hand out toward it so that he saw his fingers splayed in silhouette against it. Farther down the passage burned the emerald flame of salvation, a gift from Calina herself. It was a glorious burst of sunlight! And though the brilliance of it burned like hell to look at, it was the most delicious sight he’d ever seen. It was freedom!
He wasted no more time, but felt his way along the cold stonewalls of the tunnel toward the angelic light. The fresh air was intoxicating. It felt like he’d been holding his breath since his arrival in this horror, and now he could finally breathe. Yet, as he grew nearer, a bolt of terror seized him so sharply that he nearly felt faint. Bars blocked the exit!
“No,” he whispered, “No. No. No!”
He scrambled toward the bars, prepared to either bend them open with his own hands or throw himself on his knife right then and there. But as he knelt to a stop before the opening, he realized the truth. They weren’t bars at all. It was a shrub occluding the exit!
He pried the branches apart and crawled into them, and stuck his head out into the warm sunshine. Though the pain of the intense sunlight was nearly unbearable, the heat gripped his face like a mother’s smile. The air felt like a pagan baptism, renewing and forgiving and filled with promise. He wanted to run out into it, to dance out into the grass, to scream his joy at the blue sky.
Instead, he pulled back into the tunnel.
Caution had to be his word; he couldn’t follow his excitement and simply run wild out into the field beyond. Now was the time for forethought and calculation. Against all odds, he’d miraculously made it this close to freedom. Now he needed a plan.
As he thought about it, he noticed something odd about the shrubbery. He plucked a leaf from the branch. It was oblong and rounded and nearly an inch thick with a stubby stem. Though he hadn’t seen one since he was a small boy, he realized with a rush of joy that it wasn’t a leaf at all. This was a mushroom plum. He bit into it. The sweet juice burned his raw lips, and the pain felt nothing less than wonderful.
When he’d eaten his fill, he dropped to his knees and crept under the tangle of gnarled branches cluttering the shaft’s exit. The tree was wide and quite low to the ground. He dropped face-first to the damp, sweet earth and crawled on his belly through the tall grass and wet leaves and neat piles of rabbit droppings.
Once he’d inched his way to the drip line, he found himself looking out at a meadow that swept down and away from the castle in long, gentle rolls. The field ended at a fencerow of what looked like scrub willows nearly a half-mile out. He had a basic understanding of the layout of the castle and Dragor Field from his geography studies with Chance. Since the rising sun told him he was facing east, he knew that fencerow waiting so diligently down there for him marked the western bank of the Dragor River.
No better news could have been delivered. The Dragor River rushed north toward Na te’Yed. It crawled many dozens of miles through the southern plains until it met the Snake’s Tongue River in the heart of the great valley, Farswept Green. If he stayed on the river’s course, it’d practically deliver him to his back door. This was the road home.
The sun was a great orange ball climbing zealously up over the river. It couldn’t be more than seven bells or so. If he was lucky, the patrols would be changing shifts and he’d be able to slip down to the river unmolested. But then the memory of exactly who he’d be eluding flooded into his mind. He’d be trying to outmaneuver Vaemysh warriors.
More precisely, Vaemysh warriors and their oteuryns.
He pushed the torch’s head deep into the soft dirt and smothered the flames. Then he dragged his pack out from the tunnel, dropped it next to him beneath the pear tree, and stowed the extinguished flambeau inside it. The fire of optimism burned fervently in him; he felt like he could run that half-mile to the river at full bore without even breaking a sweat.
But he wouldn’t. Chance had taught him well how to evade the Vaemysh. It wasn’t because his mentor thought he would ever actually need to evade them, but because if he learned to evade a Vaemyn’s oteuryns, no other creature on Calevia would ever have a chance of detecting him.
He felt a pang of guilt for the resistance he’d put up before such a wondrous education. He’d fought tooth and nail every attempt Chance had made at teaching him these skills. But now? Now he knew that those lessons were very likely about to save his undeserving butt. Despite his Birthsight, despite a wealth of knowledge that was far beyond his years, he now understood how unlikely it was that he’d ever be anywhere near as wondrous a mage as Chance. He loved Chance like the father he never knew. He needed to make him proud.
Hot tears burned at his sore eyes. He blotted them against a filthy sleeve and shored up resistance against the emotion. There was no time for it. There wouldn’t be time for it until he was free of this wretched place once and for all.
He’d have to move very, very slowly with a stuttered, irregular pace. A superior tracker could sense the vibrations of a person as far as a half mile out if the ground was hard and the force powerful enough. They could detect patterns of conscious movement amid all the natural vibrations offered up from the earth. Lose the patterns and he’d lose the Vaemyn.
The grass was still for a hundred yards out. There was no significant wind, only a few anemic eddies swirling lazily farther out before him in the green and amber sea. It’d probably take him all day to make that half-mile trip, but once he did, once he slipped into the cool nectar that was the river, he’d be home free. T
he damned Vaemyn could never track him through the water. He’d grab an old log or two, let the current do its magic and be on his happy way. In a week’s time, Gods willing, he’d be home again.
With that, he picked a dozen more plums and stuffed them into the jailer’s dirty bag. It wouldn’t last him long, but he needed to travel light, and he knew there’d be plenty of food along the way home. His entire life had been spent in the wilds of Na te’Yed. And thanks to Chance’s unquenchable appetite for lessons, he knew exactly where to look for nourishment.
It was time.
Luren turned his face to the sun, whispered a solemn prayer to Calina and another to the Lesser Gods of Pentyrfal, then silently slipped beneath the low branches and swam out into the waiting grass.
VIII
THE DRAYMA
MAL FOLLOWED LUCIFEUS THROUGH THE EXTRAVAGANTLY CARVED OAK DOOR AND INTO HIS BROTHER’S OFFICE.
Once inside, he closed the door on the guards standing watch in the hall and slipped the deadbolt secure. After a moment’s consideration, he took the added precaution of dropping the heavy iron security bar across it, something he hadn’t felt the need to do since they’d constructed the administrative buildings several years ago. There’d never been a need for such security before. But tonight was different. Even with the deadbolt, the bar, and the guards posted outside the door, and two more down in the courtyard below the balcony, he felt strangely vulnerable. He felt as if he were being watched.
He turned into the expansive room. It had a high, beamed ceiling, and wide plank darkwood floors. Panels of golden brown veneer covered the walls, each of which was adorned with colorful paintings depicting some variation on either a beautiful, partially robed woman or a tall ship bravely challenging an angry sea. A wide fieldstone fireplace filled the wall opposite the door, and a pair of glass balcony doors opened into the night just to his left. He crossed over to the balcony, slipped the glass doors closed, locked them, then pulled the thick drapes shut against the night. It was just past midnight. Somehow, it felt much, much later.
Lucifeus was already carrying the lavish furniture off the heavy carpet covering the center of the great room. Mal joined in, grabbing one grotesquely carved wooden chair and stacking it on another before dragging them and a third one toward the wall.
“Damn it, Malevolus!” Lucifeus yelled at him, “Will you be careful? Those are carved from Mendophian applewood. They cost me a bloody fortune!”
Mal grabbed the next chair and slid it hard across the floor. It skated into the wall with a most satisfying bang. He cursed his brother’s immoderate tastes. This room was a nightmare of Parhronii opulence, with its imported furniture and statuary, not to mention the larger-than-life painting mounted above the fireplace. Lucifeus had commissioned that particular eyesore a few years back. It portrayed him standing on the deck of the Laughing Molly, with a boot on the rail, a hand on his sword, and the personification of heroism in his eyes. It filled nearly the entire wall above the hearth, and it looked as out of place here in the fort as earrings on a cow.
“I know what you’re thinking,” Lucifeus said.
“You barely know what you’re thinking,” Mal shot back as he squatted at the edge of the colorful wool rug, “Now help me roll this damned thing up.”
Lucifeus joined him with little more than a frown, and together they rolled the carpet away. Despite his irritation, Mal was grateful that his brother managed to fend off the pout such insults usually induced. And as he managed the thoughts, he felt an uncharacteristic moment of shame for having thrown the chair to begin with. The particular night was far too dark for brotherly bickering. He should act a bigger man than that.
Once they had stowed the carpet to the side of the room, Mal crossed back to the middle of the exposed wooden planks and sank to his knees. Lucifeus knelt directly across from him. His brother then laid his open hand against the wood and gave it a short, quick push. A sharp click resonated. In the same instant, a square hatch surfaced just a hair above floor level.
Together they gripped the edge of the exposed lid and pulled it free. A two-by-two foot square of darkness yawned up at them with an expression of utter indifference. Mal wondered how so massive a worry could be concealed in so insignificant a hole.
He looked up at Lucifeus. “I swear I never thought it’d come to this.”
“Aye, feels like father’s watching from the corners, doesn’t it?”
Mal wiped his sweating palms on his thighs. “Aye,” he whispered, “And I doubt he’d be happy I’m even here.”
“Gods’ hooks, Malevolus! Whatever do you mean by that? I won’t hear you spouting such ridiculous blather, I swear I won’t. And why are you whispering?”
“This is your inheritance, not mine.” Mal regretted the words the moment he stupidly kicked them out. “I mean… that’s not what I meant. I’m just—”
Lucifeus laughed. “Brother, I dare say this black secret became yours the very moment I showed it to you so many years ago.”
“We were kids then. I didn’t ask you to see it.”
“Neither did you beg it off.”
“I damned well should’ve.”
“But you did not,” Lucifeus said seriously, “And now you’re here, and we’re still brothers, and not a single thing has changed.”
The words lashed Mal with another pulse of shame. They faced the unknown here, after all, performing a task neither ever dreamed would actually come due. Yet, even as he thought it through, he knew it was more complicated than that. The sorry and straight truth was that he was afraid. Complicating it any further than that was a simple waste of steam.
“I need you, Mal,” Lucifeus said as if reading his mind, “You’re the strong one. It’s Calina’s joke on us that I was firstborn. Truth is you’re more up to this burden than I. You always have been.”
“Oh, I see it now. That’s what it all comes down to, isn’t it? The burden? You are one lazy son of a bitch, you know that?”
“Yes, dear Brother, I’m most acutely aware of that trait. And, damn me once again if that isn’t exactly why Calina gifted me with you.”
Mal knew Lucifeus was perfectly correct in his assessment. They were stronger as a team than either could ever be alone. Their personalities synergized each other. It was why they hadn’t murdered one another years ago.
As he studied the ominous square hole in the floor, he again rubbed his wet palms on his thighs. “Let’s get on with this.”
Lucifeus nodded, then reached carefully down into the darkness. He groped for a moment, then pulled out a modest humpbacked chest. It seemed a terribly minor and insignificant old box to be harboring their fates.
Mal climbed gracelessly to his feet and followed Lucifeus across the room to a desk sitting at the wall just left of the door. Kneeling on that hard wood had sent them both limping, a fact he found most disheartening. They were getting older, he and his brother. They’d lived hard and fast for most of their lives, and neither bore nearly as much physical abuse as they deserved. Then again, the burden waiting in that puny box would likely be their payment due plus the vig. This could very well be the beginning of their last great adventure together, and he didn’t know if he was terrified or thrilled for it.
Lucifeus set the chest on the wide desktop. Mal slid a tall glass oil lamp closer and slipped up the flame.
The box was even less remarkable in the brighter light. All iron with one latch secured by two modest locks, it was little more than a miser’s hope chest. His brother added the second lock decades ago, giving Mal the key. It was a moment that bound them even closer than they’d already been. Though his brother inherited the tax of this box, they’d made a pact as children on that day a lifetime ago to carry it together, a pact that was explicit and enduring. They would stand side by side through this life no matter what manner of misery or chaos knocked at their cabin doors.
Lucifeus pulled a key from his waistcoat and held it up between them. A wicked twinkle possessed his eyes,
as if he were secretly delighted to look inside again after all these years. Mal produced his own key and held it up beside his brother’s. He wasn’t feeling nearly so intrigued.
“Sink me, Brother,” Lucifeus said, “You should see your face. I swear you look as if someone just walked over your grave.”
“Just open the damned thing.”
Lucifeus slipped his key into the first lock. “I’m pretty sure any snakes in this chest are long dead, Malevolus.”
The lock clucked softly.
Mal looked up at his brother, at his preened face glimmering between the borders of his long black hair like a seductive wraith in the lamplight. “If we do this,” he whispered, “it’s going to change everything. You understand that, right?”
Lucifeus removed the lock and laid it on the desk beside the chest. “I do,” he said, smiling impishly.
“What if we’re wrong? What if everything’s not as we think. What if we’ve misjudged the situation? What if we’re opening it in error?”
“We have misjudged nothing,” Lucifeus replied as he took Mal’s key and slipped it into the second lock, “much as I wish it were true. Esoria confirmed the demons once again walk among us. So scat away your treacherous doubts, my dear Brother. After a thousand odd years, the time has come to at long last open the Drayma. You should consider yourself privileged for the honor.”
“Privileged? About as privileged as the winner of a complimentary beating.”
The second lock clucked. Mal’s heart sank. Such a soft, gentle sound to open so wretched a gate.
Lucifeus removed the lock and laid it beside the first one. “There’s nothing in this box we can’t handle. The Brothers Fark have sailed more perfidious seas than this and not only survived, but fairly prospered.”
Mal wondered if that was true.
Lucifeus cautiously raised the humped lid. The contents of the box within were covered with a moldering red cloth that may have once been silk or satin. It was dry and threadbare, and the edges crumpled to dust as he pulled it away.
