Finding Real Magic

by Shawn Keys

  Mike was just below her and took the blast badly. Never quite getting a good grip, he was sucked along the stones. His frantic hands reached out and caught hold of Jake’s pant leg.

  Instantly, Jake was jerked down into the water. Sputtering as he fought to keep his head above water, Jake’s grip went white as he held on to the relic-spike driven into the ground. His ropes creaked with the double-weight on them, but looked like they might hold.

  Jake didn’t look nearly as certain. Terror gripped him as he fought to keep his hands on the relic. He wasn’t about to trust the ropes alone to hold him. He shouted, “I can’t hold on, Miguel! Grab onto something! ”

  “Don’t you fucking let me go!” Mike cried desperately.

  Zahn heard it all in the background. He saw his own death coming fast. No matter how he deflected the water, the pressure was too great. He was slipping, and none of their bits of climbing gear were in deep enough to hold them. The weight was too much.

  Sucking in a panicked breath, he shouted to Angelica and Kaylee, “Let me go! Cut the ropes! Get behind the construct! I’ll…I’ll hold it as long as I can!” He knew it would fade as soon as he died. But he would close his eyes and keep it burned in his mind until the spikes ended him.

  Angelica’s blue eyes flared as brightly as the azure construct. “I’m not letting you go!”

  Kaylee tightened her fingers around him. “Neither of you are going anywhere!”

  Zahn clenched his teeth in pain. He loved them. But love wasn’t going to change the laws of physics. He saw the weakly placed pinions starting to slip free. “Please, let –”

  He never got the chance to finish. Before he could plead another word, the metal spikes gave way. Wrapped together in their ropes, the three of them hurtled down the death chute plunging toward the spikes below.

  Battered by the rocks and water alike, Zahn hoped his ring had just enough power to pull his trick twice. He managed to activate the time-relic’s power. The roar of the water stretched out into a strange moan. He fell faster, racing past the women, then was brought up short by the ropes holding them all together.

  Sending a silent prayer to whatever goodly powers of the heavens that might be watching, he activated the final charge on his gauntlet and painted a barrier across the tunnel floor. It angled into the wall, forming a pocket of sorts.

  He was already past it. That couldn’t be helped. It was the only way he could get the angle right. Kaylee and Angelica struck it a moment later. The force of the water shoved them deeper against the wall, then wedged them tightly into the pocket he’d created.

  The ropes went taut with a snap. Zahn screamed in agony as they wrenched his limbs in a dozen different directions at once.

  Then held him.

  The water continued to race past them. Kaylee and Angelica scrambled to keep their heads above water while screaming as Zahn’s weight threatened to drag them over the barrier. Zahn dangled below, just past the entrance to the tunnel. Pounded by the rushing water, he bounced back and forth above the spikes only a few feet below him.

  Still disoriented, Zahn heard a distressed yell only a few seconds before Mike went careening past. The crushing water carried him right into the waiting jaws of the spike pit. Unlike Gord, he flew into them a little more horizontally. It didn’t really help. His back broke against the first and sent him into a wobbly spin. His skull smashed against another, and his cries of pain were suddenly silenced. His body struck the pit floor a second later.

  The rush of water started to ebb. Zahn realized that the crushing wave had spent itself. This wasn’t an unceasing river. But the trap wouldn’t stay empty. Instinctively realizing what needed to happen, Zahn only had one option. And it involved the last person he wanted to trust right about then. “Jake!”

  There was a sputtering cough from further up the tunnel. “What?”

  “The water! It’s stopping! The sluice gate is going to close! If the cistern behind it fills, then we’ll have to deal with another water hammer when we open it again! You have to wedge it open with your invincible stake! It’s the only thing that won’t shatter however much weight they’ve put into the mechanism!”

  “What if the water starts again while I’m climbing!”

  “It won’t! As long as you keep that gate open! The flow is already down to a small stream!”

  Jake didn’t sound pleased, but accepted the task. “Fine. But get up here! I have no idea what other traps are going to be waiting! Ash…” A small pause of mourning. “Ash didn’t make it. And I lost Mike.”

  Zahn’s eyes closed. Ash had been a pain in the ass, but he’d respected her. “Alright, Jake. I hear you. I’m not free of the pit yet. We’ll get up to you as soon as we can. Just hold that gate. Hear me?”

  “Sure. I’ll try.” His wet scuffling up the slippery slope was proof he was working himself higher.

  “Angie? Leea? You two with me?” Zahn was terrified to ask.

  Immediately, Leea’s gave a pained groan, “You’re sexy naked, but all that muscle weighs a ton! Get up here! ”

  Zahn couldn’t suppress a chuckle. “Two seconds, love. I’m practically upside down right now. Angie?”

  Her warm answer came, “I’m fine too. Just hurry. I have no idea how we’re holding on to you. If the wrong rope snaps, we could lose you.”

  Nodding, he tried one more name, “Heather?” Nothing. Damn. Our head-sets and ear-pieces are waterproof, but the relay was probably knocked out by the water.

  From far up the tunnel, Jake called back to them. “Uhh, something’s happening! I found the gate and jammed the stake in! Water is pouring in, but only a narrow stream. Just like you thought. Umm, but, a strange glowing sigil just appeared above it! It… looks angry. You better hurry!”

  Zahn didn’t have to ask what the mercenary meant. Another sigil had just appeared on the far side of the pit from him. Bright green, as tall as he was, and ugly enough to make his skin crawl simply by looking at it. What the hell is that? But he knew what it was. Real magic, again. A spell left behind to kill explorers trying to get to the Staff. Not two traps in one. Three. And I don’t want to find out what this one does.

  He moved as quickly but smoothly as he could, as every tug on the ropes might be hurting his lovers. He reached up and snagged hold of the edge of his energy wall construct. It felt flimsy now; his focus wasn’t strong enough to hold it for much longer. He was getting tired.

  Angelica and Kaylee seized hold of his forearms as soon as they were within reach. With their help, he got back into the tunnel and laid out onto the damp but mercifully solid floor. “Well, that was horrible.”

  Within the pit, a second glowing sigil appeared next to the first. He didn’t need Jake’s yell to guess that the sluice gate showed the same. A countdown. But to what?

  Kaylee echoed Zahn’s earlier thought, “So bloody efficient. Two traps, one pit.”

  Angelica laughed darkly. “Makes a sick sort of sense. They didn’t have bulldozers or anything back then to make a huge underground system. And they didn’t have generations to build it, like the Europeans digging out huge catacombs that grew over centuries. They dug one massive hole, and then layered the traps over each other.”

  Zahn pointed at the third glowing sigil swelling into life. “We’re not going to wait long to see the third one.” He wrestled a comm relay out of his pack and jammed it into the same spot where the other had been before the water tore it free. He activated it and said, “Heather?”

  “There you are! I was scared out of my mind! ”

  Zahn smiled, but sympathized. They might be inches from death, but he would hate sitting in a half-dark apartment listening to a silent mic and wondering if his loved ones were dead or alive. “Sorry, Hally. We’ll change it so you get a lost signal notification. That way you can tell the equipment is malfunctioning and not us dying.”

  “Unless you get crushed along with the equipment .” She said sourly. Then, warmth crept into her tone. “Hally, huh ?” />
  “Figured I had a nickname for the other two.”

  “I like it. Approved. ”

  He chuckled, but then a fourth rune appeared. “Something bad is happening. We need to get moving.”

  Mike’s tormented body twitched.

  Angelica sat bolt upright. “Damn it! We can’t just go! Mike’s still alive!”

  Kaylee shook her head vigorously. “No way! Look! His head is twisted all the way around and his back is folded in half! He’s dead for sure… oh… oh no…”

  A fifth rune illuminated… and Gord’s body spasmed awkwardly. Still pinned on the top of a spike, the man’s corpse jerked with the first signs of unholy life.

  Zahn slid his knife free, “Cut the ropes! Fast!”

  All three sawed and slashed feverishly at the looped cord that had saved their lives but now threatened to end them. Angelica was free first, then Kaylee.

  Even as he snapped the last rope hooked around him, Zahn saw the sixth rune close the ring around the pit.

  Gord’s eyes blazed open, lit from within by a malevolent green light. The creature grasped at the spike piercing its chest and heaved. Little by little, it started to work its way up toward freedom.

  His wasn’t the only corpse moving. Despite Mike’s shattered spine, the creature he had become twisted upright and stood on his feet. Its head was backward, but it wrenched the skull back around and then shambled toward the side of the pit below the tunnel. Punching fingers right into the stone, it began to climb. Skin ripped away from its bones as it dug into the rock, but the undead creature didn’t seem to care .

  Around him, there were other skeletal bones from long dead adventurers quivering in place. They started to drag towards each other by some invisible force. One shoulder socket locked against an arm, and the fingers on the hand began to clench.

  Zahn cursed, “Oh shit! Go! Go! Up the corridor!”

  Jake heard and called back, “What is it? The last runes just closed the ring around the gate! But it is still open!”

  Zahn yelled back as he scrambled up the wet incline right behind his lovers, “Keep that gate open whatever it takes!”

  Together they clawed up the wet stonework. The footing was treacherous and they couldn’t go fast. They had slid halfway down the tunnel system in mere seconds, but it took almost two minutes to reach where they had been before.

  Behind them, a choked moan reverberated up the tunnel. Zahn had the distinct impression that there was victory and hunger together in that moan. Zahn guessed it was Mike’s corpse that had reached the tunnel and caught their scent.

  The trio crawled into view of where Ash lay sprawled on the floor. Angelica surged ahead, stooping to test Ash’s breathing. Her hand came away from the back of her neck stained crimson. “Look at this, you two.” A touch of grief was there, but anger was creeping in.

  Kaylee knelt by Ash’s side. “Can I help her?” It didn’t take long for her to realize the woman had already grown cold. Her head hung.

  Zahn peered down, seeing the wicked gash that had severed Ash’s spine. “Son of a bitch.” His hand rested on Angelica’s shoulder. “I know the water must have washed the whole tunnel clean. But can you sense any animals ahead?”

  Angelica took a moment to close Ash’s eyes. Then, she closed her own. “A few. A long way above us. There’s a cavern. Everything is dark.”

  Zahn pressed, “But there would be a hole. Or a trench. A way to contain all that water that just about killed us.”

  “I’ll try to find it.”

  His voice hardened. “Can you find an animal that’s dangerous?”

  Angelica shared his resolve. “I’ll try.”

  Kaylee took her arm, “I’ll lead you as we walk.”

  A dread moan echoed off the walls. Zahn turned to see Mike’s broken corpse lurch into view. His jaw hung open and let his tongue loll out. The creature’s luminous green eyes narrowed in further hunger. The zombie moved like a poorly constructed puppet, but it came at them all the same.

  Zahn grimaced. “Hate to kill you twice, Miguel.” He leveled his pistol at the thing’s head and fired. The bullet punched into the zombie’s brain and blasted an exit wound out the other side. The gunshot blasted their ears, but soon faded.

  Mike’s corpse rocked a little from the impact, but nothing more. With a guttural moan, it shambled closer.

  Zahn’s mouth dropped open a little. “Well, that didn’t work like in the movies.”

  The undead thing stretched out a hand, swiping at him with tormented need.

  The relic-diver had seen a lot in his life. But having those slightly bloated fingers grasping at him while all his trusted relic-magic was used up was enough to ignite the visceral fear in him. Zahn yanked on his trigger, pumping bullet after bullet into the creature. They tore apart the hand reaching for him, puncturing the palm, shattering the cluster of carpal bones, and finally blowing the last two fingers right off.

  A shimmer of metal broke through his panic.

  It was the metal of a ring flickering in the light of his crystal-relic, skipping away on one of the fingers he had just blasted.

  Mike’s relic.

  The finger skipped away and rebounded off the tunnel wall.

  The unholy abomination wasn’t waiting. It hadn’t felt the damage being done to its hand. It raked at Zahn, but couldn’t seem to grab hold with its damaged hand. It pummeled him along the shoulder while scraping its fingernails of the other hand along the protective layer of Zahn’s invisibility cloak.

  The creature hadn’t caught hold yet. Instead of running, Zahn braced his legs and heaved against the zombie’s chest. Launching it back against the wall, he dove along the ground and grabbed at the bone finger. The horrid thing was still wiggling, supernaturally gliding back toward Mike. It wouldn’t take long to find its master and reattach itself .

  Zahn pinned it to the ground and ripped the ring off. Pushing the relic into a pocket, he pushed himself upward onto his feet.

  A heavy blow hammered him back to the ground. Groaning in pain, Zahn spun to find the animated remnants of Gord standing above him. The zombie pulled back for another slamming attack with its fists. Acting on instinct, Zahn curled in his legs and kicked into the zombie’s stomach with the heels of his boots. He wasn’t trying to hurt it. That seemed impossible. Instead, he concentrated on shoving it away. The momentum of his double-kick flung the animated corpse a half-dozen paces back and gave Zahn a little space.

  But Mike’s corpse was almost back. The dead man’s moan rumbled down on him.

  Then gunshots roared, canceling out the horrid sound.

  Angelica stood a dozen paces away, trying to keep a stable firing stance. Summoning every lesson she had ever learned about proper shooting, she aimed down at the corpse’s legs. Her inexperience nearly defeated her. Half of the heavy slugs missed. But enough connected to blast apart the bones connecting its left foot to its leg. With the zombie’s next stride, it collapsed onto a knee and wasn’t able to finish the blow that might have stopped Zahn from running.

  Run he did. Leaving the two creatures behind, Zahn bolted up to where his two lovers stood.

  Kaylee punched him in the arm. “What kind of stunt was that? A lost relic isn’t worth a lost you, you crazy fool!”

  The adrenalin rush and the high at finding himself still alive made him laugh. “Love you too, Leea! Now… run!”

  As he said it, they saw another half-dozen skeletal creatures staggered from around the bend in the tunnel. The whole pit is coming after us! Zahn feared. The tunnel was still incredibly slick, but fear of the creeping horror gave them wings. Less than a minute later, they were rounding the last bend in the tunnel.

  Jake was already through the gate. The six glowing sigils around the gate were each the size of Zahn’s palm, and the gate itself was as wide as his outstretched arm. Half of it was closed, but the mechanism couldn’t shut the rest of the way against the indestructible rod holding it open. The sound of grinding was loud as th
e rock door kept trying to creak downward.

  Jake peered out at them from the semi-darkness beyond. He had broken some chem-lights to give himself a little light. “What is going on out there? Why are you shooti –” The first of the skeletons clacked around the bend in the tunnel. His eyes went super wide. “What the fuck are those ? No fucking way I’m –”

  Zahn saw the panic in the man rising. “Don’t you dare close that gate you bastard!” He hated leaving the women behind, but he knew they could fend for themselves. They certainly weren’t going to waste their time! He activated his time-relic one last time. Like below, it hadn’t charge very much. He didn’t get more than a half-second’s worth of speed.

  But that was enough. He took five running strides and dove headlong through the gate. He chopped Jake’s forearm to break his hold on the stake, then hit the mercenary with a shoulder-block that carried them both backward into the darkness behind. They plunged together into the thigh-deep water at the base of the cistern. The surface churned around them as water cascaded from above. The current tried to carry them back toward the gate.

  Jake pushed against him, screaming, “They’re coming for us! We need to shut them out!”

  Zahn slammed a fist into his gut and shoved him back against the cistern wall. “Not till the other two are through!”

  He didn’t have to hold Jake off for long. Angelica and Kaylee had kept up their pace. They scrambled through the gate and took hold of the stake together. With their combined strength, they tugged the relic free. The sudden release of tension dunked them into the water, and they came up sputtering.

  Immediately, the gate slammed shut in the faces of the zombies.

  Breathing hard, they all watched with strained eyes, expecting the worst.

  The green sigils around the gate weakened and disappeared. The moans faded into nothing.

  Zahn rolled away from Jake and sank against the wall in relief. The never-quiet practical part of his brain informed him the water level was already starting to rise. The cistern was refilling with the constant stream from above, now unable to escape through the gate. It was almost up to their waists. Worse, it wasn’t all that warm. Not icy cold, but cool enough to be a problem if they stayed submerged in it .