necariin
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Chapter 595
🕑 Added 2023-05-26 23:06:57 +0000 UTCEnjoy!
ToC
* * *
Light, but this is excruciatingly boring.
The thought was inescapable as Mervin trailed behind the Dwarven Chanter Tzfell. She had requested some assistance from Loquis and had instead volunteered Mervin for the honor. Mervin was originally going to refuse—he had planned to get some extra training in with the other Blades—but that’s when Loquis hit him with those dire hound eyes.
The things I do for friends, he thought with a scowl. Loquis had apparently made plans. That Half-Orc better actually make a move on her, or I’ll be so very cross.
“Come closer, lad. I need to see this with the lantern,” the Chanter said.
Can’t you summon a magelight? Why do you need me? Yet Mervin walked up, holding the mage-wrought lamp up so that it cast its bright light over a wide mural. It had been hacked at with some sort of weapon, cracking the myriad tiles and sculpted shapes until it was almost unrecognizable. For all his bellyaching, Mervin did find the halls of the Kingsrock fascinating…and sad too.
“So much beauty, lost,” he said.
Chanter Tzfell nodded solemnly. “It is a travesty of the highest order.” She ran her hands down the mural, following the brutal gashes in the stonework. “You can see here, where they heated their blades so that it would disfigure the stone beneath as well. Tough to do, especially with high Tier materials.”
“The fires, the wanton destruction…it’s like they were trying to make it worse for all that came after them.”
“It was absolutely an intentional act. See here? This was a glyph once, an anchor for any number of wards that laced these halls. Tch. It is likely the invaders were chasing down protective enchantments and disabling them first and foremost.”
He noticed she often referred to them as invaders, not Dwarves. Mervin wondered if she wanted to pull away from her connection with such heartless devastation, or if perhaps it had another meaning he was missing.
“Was there sigaldry here, or here?” Mervin asked, genuinely curious. He pointed to two other gashes that sliced down through the mural and into the floor itself.
“No. That—that seems to be a stray blow.”
Mervin didn’t know if he believed that. They had passed many places where things had been melted, burned, broken, or smashed in a way that seemed spiteful to him. The Chanter, however, was reluctant to admit that though.
“Have you written down the mural and its description?” she asked.
He grumbled, but he shifted the ring handle of the lantern onto his wrist before retrieving the paper and pen he’d tucked under his arm. He started scratching out their location, Tower 2, Floor 12, Passage E before jotting down a quick summarization of the art. Looks like a big soldier, maybe a giant, wearing full plate. Swirling colors surround the figure. Mountains, snow, and a setting sun in the background. Broken with weapons, slashed….eleven times by Dwarven invaders.
That was the real reason the Chanter needed an assistant. She was cataloging things around the Stronghold, and had been doing it for days on her own, judging by the ream of paper on his board. Why was anyone’s guess. Mervin figured she was compiling an account for the Autarch. The Chanters work for him, right?
“Oh. Oh. Lad, come closer. Down here.” Chanter Tzfell was crouched low on the ground, apparently inspecting the breaks Mervin had pointed out. He crouched as well, putting the lantern to the floor. “See this? And this? What do you think this is?”
“More cracks in the floor?”
“No, no. These are too regular, too perfect. If you—do you have a way to visualize Mana?” She waved her hands at his blank stare. “Nevermind. It doesn’t matter. There are sigils here, formed into the stonework itself. Hidden, like most Nymean enchantments. They cross the floor from the wall—from the mural—and end…here.”
The Chanter scooted back until she was standing in the center of the mural alcove. Mervin followed her gaze, sweeping the mage lantern over until it illuminated a shallow depression in the floor. Three grooves met there, forming a nine-pointed star where they all intersected, as if the star was throwing off rays of light.
“Blessed Night,” she whispered. “I see.”
Mervin certainly didn’t. It just looked like a weird tripping hazard. “What is—”
A chiming bell rang through the halls, clear as if it was hanging above his own shoulder, and Mervin pivoted to find its source. There was nothing, but it was followed up by a familiar voice, just as close and clear.
“Calling all Claw. The Autarch’s expedition is leavin’ within fifteen minutes. Minutes? Is that—? Ugh, why didn’t you just say that. We’re goin’ in a quarter glass, folks! Wrap up your shit and get down to the Gloamin’ Gate or you’ll get left behind.”
“Evie—!”
The voices cut off abruptly, and Mervin’s lips stretched into a wide smile. That last one sounded an awful lot like a certain Half-Orc mage. Then the content of the message settled in and he just about sighed in pleasured relief. “Oh ah, we should get back then. Right?”
The Chanter, however, was fully engrossed in the floor. “I am not in a hurry. This requires study. I need to see if there are more, and how many. I think—hmm.”
She continued to run her hands across the floor, feeling at something. Probably doing magic. Mervin shifted nervously from foot to foot. “Are you sure? They said they’d leave us behind if we’re not there in time.”
The Chanter did not look particularly phased by that revelation. She was fully engrossed in her study, until she suddenly stood up and snatched the board from Mervin’s hands.
“Hey!”
“I need to see—Ah. No. Not this. Not—yes. Yes.” She flipped through pages, earmarking one and then three other annotations. “This is the fourth mural like this I have found. The flooring in the rest had been devastated by blunt tools, though. On purpose?”
A clarion shriek echoed through the halls from far away, and Mervin couldn’t handle it anymore. “That’s the Autarch’s Chimera. They’re leaving!”
“Hush child, it hasn’t been a quarter glass yet.”
Mervin ground his teeth. “Do you require my assistance any longer?”
“Hm? No, no, you can go. I need to—”
The Chanter kept speaking, but Mervin didn’t hear the words because he was already off. He bounded down the hall and down the nearest staircase. The last thing he wanted was to be left behind from the action, again.
* * *
Getting out of the Kingsrock was a lot easier than getting in. Felix was pleased to find a familiar set of boundary stones located within the Stronghold itself. They were arranged strangely, the path between them describing a twisted loop twenty feet wide and more than three times that in length, and it descended down to just above the entrance to the caverns below. It was, Felix had discovered, the normal path toward the underground areas, but if activated by someone with the proper Authority it would instead lead them out into the greater Hoarfrost.
“This leads all over the Hoarfrost,” Laur said, marveling at the diagram that had appeared before them at the start of the boundary path. It was like a System notification, only made of swirling gold and crossed with the shimmering colors of a glacier. It was a map, not just of the Starfield Step (which hovered slightly separate from the rest), but the Hoarfrost as well.
“Wow. This place is big,” Beef said. “Where’s Nagast? There?”
“Yeah, by that break in the mountains,” Felix said. “This is awfully impressive.”
“I mean it’s big, but don’t pat yourself on the back too hard.”
“No, Evie. I meant the access points to the Starfield Step. Look here and here,” Felix pointed to points of serpentine and sapphire on the golden map. “These are the areas where the tribes entered the Step at the start of all this. Laur, am I reading this right? Does this path allow us to leave through any of them?”
“It certainly seems that way,” the tall Elf said. He traced several fingers through the map, disturbing it like a thick curtain of water. Colorful ripples extended from his touch, flitting across the map from the boundary points toward the Kingsrock at the center. “I am unsure how this functions. The song of it…it borrows heavily from something other than Harmony.”
“Dissonance?” Felix asked.
Laur gave him a sharp look. “Of course not. Using Dissonance would unravel any Harmonics it was placed within. Not even the mighty Nym were above the rules of the Realms.”
Felix grunted. He didn’t believe that, but it wasn’t worth arguing. “Alright, so if these go all over, where does—aha. Perfect.” Felix turned to his assembled team and the ice sleds that were beside them. Those were packed with supplies and drawn by a team of Hoarhounds that were cautiously sniffing at Pit. “Everyone! Follow me.”
They started down the boundary path, walking with a steady, distance eating gait. Most of the Claw were afoot, with only a few driving the sleds in lieu of their Frost Giant friends. Felix led the way, but Vess, Evie, Beef, Harn, and the Chanters were close behind. The path was lined with small stones and it crunched beneath their feet, a steady counterpoint to the hum of the inscribed stones beside them.
“Will your new Chanceller have any issues with her duties?” Vess asked.
“Nah. Kimaris has a good head on her shoulders, and she’s ambitious. She already made it clear to them that the Title they value so highly will be revoked if they break their Oath, and everyone seems eager to toe the line.”
“It is an impressive Title, considering who it is drawing stats from,” Vess admitted. “Do you have any clue what percentage it is?”
“Just about ten percent.” Vess whistled appreciatively, and Felix grinned. “That’s what they said.”
The transition from path to elsewhere was a subtle one. The sound of crunching gravel faded as the hum of the stones increased, and the effervescent light slowly muted itself, until only a chill white sun shone upon them all. By the time Felix noticed that, he was standing among a collection of upthrust rocks. They weren’t standing stones—though some sigaldry existed among some moss-coated nubs nearby—and instead seemed to be the remains of some ancient geological feature, worn by wind, ice, and time. Outside of the broken tor was flat tundra, unrelieved for as far as even Felix’s eyes could see.
“Where’re we now?” Harn asked. Tzfell climbed up onto the rock behind him, peering off into the distance.
“Much farther southeast than I could have hoped.” Felix called up the golden map again through his Authority screen. He had puzzled that out while walking, and with an effort of Will he added a series of dark tunnels across the map. “And if we walk about a mile south, we can hop a ride through a Dark Passage. C’mon.”
A bit further on, Felix tore open the face of reality to reveal a patch of star-drenched night. It felt a touch easier than before, though he wasn’t sure how much of that was his imagination. He did know that Labyrinthine Wing had gained a level after claiming Khalheim, and instinctively he knew it was because of that fact. The knowledge had beamed itself into his brain the moment he contemplated the issue, coming from the pattern that constituted his Skill, and any time he added more Territories it would level again.
While it may not have been easier to open, it definitely was a larger opening than before. Now it could easily accommodate their oversized sleds, and his team filed into the Dark Passage with little issue. Felix grasped his hooked blade and sent a pulse of his Will through it.
“Karys, we’re entering a Dark Passage now. Mark it down. I’ll contact you when we emerge.”
The sword buzzed, green-gold. “Of course, my Lord.”
Felix and Pit were the last to enter, closing it behind them.
Inside, the normal pitch darkness was lightened; still Void-like, but now with a touch of gray. The mountains in the distance were more detailed, and the stone platform they entered upon even had the start of some sort of workmanship. It appeared ancient and dilapidated, brickwork worn by feet over a thousand years, pitted and cracked.
Hm. Is this a feature of Labyrinthine Wing’s level up? Felix scratched his head as he entered, studying the changes. Or was it just already here?
Zara and others had told him that when she had utilized the Dark Passages in the Verdant Pass, she had been forced to expend her Will and Mana to create a physical construct. A bridge, something that everyone could interact with so they wouldn’t fall into the Void, never to be seen again. It had also been easily affected by the Wills of others, enough that many of the soldiers had been required drugs to dull their senses.
His experience with Dark Passages had so far been wildly different, but then Zara didn’t have the same Titles as Felix. Chthonic Traveler was potent, indeed.
“Felix! Make the Sailwhale!” Pit shouted from ahead. He was already at the edge of the broken cliff, bouncing among the Claw. Several of the soldiers watched him with half-hidden smiles.
“Ugh. I thought we weren’t calling it that?”
“Oh no, we’re definitely calling it that,” Beef said.
“Looks like a fish, flies like a fish…” Evie paused. “Something something Sailwhale.”
“Great,” Felix muttered. He mustered his Will, and the nature of the Dark Passage shifted to accommodate it. “Wonderful.”
Comments
Kevin McClelland
TFTC!
