Chapter 22
Twenty-Two
The cold had been forgotten during the excitement of the fight, but after things calmed down, that returned with a vengeance.
Our clothes had been soaked, and that created such an extra chilling effect that even the Core dwellers shivered.
Sifuso was getting sluggish. My teeth were chattering so hard, it was hard to talk.
I got my Red enchanted bowl out of my pack, activated the magic hot enough to simmer a stew, and clutched that against my chest in a desperate attempt to dry out my gloves and warm my fingers enough to feel them. The bowl helped a lot.
We’d received a few minor injuries. The gash on my neck hurt, but it was shallow enough a simple bandage stopped the bleeding.
The cut on my arm throbbed, but it wasn’t too bad either.
Sifuso had gotten the worst injury of anyone with the deep cuts on his scaly chest, but lacertians had really thick skin, so hardly any blood came out.
I think being a lizard, the cold might have actually slowed his blood down even more.
Bognar and Danny had both gotten roughed up a little, but overall, I think everyone was feeling too triumphant to worry about their aches and pains. The Outcasts had been tested and won!
With me being too cold to think straight, let alone talk, Rade took over the role of the sensible one.
Which, frankly, was a rather frightening prospect, but he seemed to have everything in hand.
I’m sure his usual bluster would be saved for when our survival wasn’t at stake, and he had more of an audience.
“Get those boats pulled all the way up and tied to the rocks. I’d prefer to not have the high tide carry off our ride home.
” Rade made a good call there. Without our boats, our options were to wait for Morton to come rescue us, which was unlikely, or to send Trax for help, and him successfully communicating what was happening to some random fisherman was even less likely than our gnome suddenly turning courageous.
“Krachma, would you kindly do the same with those less fortunate adventurers’ boat so we have a spare? ”
“And I shall check their bodies for valuables.” Azarin had never been the squeamish type. “I’m not expecting much, but you never know. Maybe one of them was an enchanter.”
“Danny, climb up top there and keep watch. If you see the monsters coming back, holler. And be careful, there could be more of those things hibernating in the sand.”
“What about him?” Bognar asked, nodding toward me. “Carnavon’s gone white as a deadlander.”
“Indeed,” Rade agreed. “That complexion is more suited to my people than someone from the land of perpetual fire. You should get out of this wind.”
“I’ll be fine,” I managed to say between the chattering teeth. “When’s this summer thing you keep telling me going to start again?”
“About six months from now.”
“Fuck.” I hid behind a boulder with my bowl to get out of the wind.
It was ironic that the very first spell I’d learned was still one of my most useful.
This humble bowl had saved my hotlander ass from the horrible state that Trax referred to as hypothermia a few times now.
It was like huddling around my own personal campfire worth of warmth.
Holding the fully activated piece of metal in my bare hands was a great way to get burned, but currently, it was just steaming away salt water.
After a few minutes, I even got enough feeling back in my hands to reload my gun.
Thankfully, it appeared that only one of the wax paper cartridges on my belt had gotten ruined by moisture.
I tried my best to get the rest dried off before their powder got soaked too.
I looked forward to the day I could afford nicer ammunition with cases made of brass, which was supposed to be far more reliable.
As I sat there, gradually warming up, I noticed there was an odd pattern to the nearby sand.
It was too lumpy, and there seemed to be a pattern.
I crawled over, brushed some of the sand aside, and swore to myself when I saw the speckled white color beneath.
We didn’t have birds where I was from, but I’d seen things like this more recently from our neighbors’ chickens, only this was far bigger than what came out of a chicken!
I brushed off another two of the lumps and found they also contained half buried eggs.
Then I looked gradually outward and realized there were dozens more of the things stashed here.
Azarin stuck her head over the top of the boulder. “I looted the dead adventurers and found three Tetars, a rusty longsword, one silver pinky ring, two useable daggers, and a gold tooth.”
I didn’t want to ask how she’d gotten the tooth out. “Imagine rowing to your death because you got greedy after hearing Rufus sing a song.”
“A sad way to go.” Then Azarin saw all the eggs. “Oh, wow.”
“Yeah. This must be why those squishy beasts were so dedicated to keeping us away.”
“That’s a lot of baby monsters waiting to hatch… Well, shit. You know, I really shouldn’t feel pity for something that just tried to kill me, but now I do.”
I knew what she meant. I’d come here looking for treasure to keep a crime boss off our backs, not to terrorize some strange tribe of mutants. The saint I followed was pragmatic, not cruel.
“We should leave them alone.”
“Agreed, Oz, and good. The sooner we’re gone, the better. Which is why I came to get you. We’ve found the entrance to the lower levels.”
The narrow stairwell stretched so far down, we couldn’t see the bottom. This had to be the entrance to Korthican’s lair.
I took out my old crawler light charm and set it floating in the air above my head. A few of the others had light charms as well, which was good, seeing as we didn’t have anything to make torches out of unless we busted parts off one of the boats.
There was a significant amount of sand on the steps, but it hadn’t been disturbed recently with tracks.
It appeared the monsters didn’t go down there very often.
Probably because they’d learned the hard way that what looked like a perfectly good cave was too dangerous. Powerful wizards loved them some traps.
The Outcasts had turned out to be fairly decent at fighting unarmed mutants, but this was the part I’d really been dreading.
“Well, let’s get to getting, then.” Rufus began walking down the stairs, but Azarin snagged him by the arm. “What?”
“Hold your eagles. This is an old wizard’s laboratory. There’s bound to be fifty curses down there waiting to kill us.”
“She’s right. Korthican was on the Council. Mages like that are always jealous of their secrets. One wrong step…” Rade clapped his hands together. “Dead! There will surely be many traps, both magical and mundane mechanical.”
“Not to mention they like to leave behind things like golems or guardian spirits,” Danny added.
“And those can linger for centuries! Only activating when some foolish adventurer does something that draws its wrath.” When we all looked at him, a bit surprised that our young Under Slumper knew about such things, he shrugged.
“I had a cousin who was in a mercenary adventuring company and he used to tell us stories, until he got his face ripped off by a tomb wraith.”
Brave Rufus Rudnik wasn’t about to have the potential removal of his face dissuade him from glory. “No need to worry. We’ve got Carnavon. He was a trapper. Naturally, he must be an expert about all things trap-related.”
“There’s got to be a vast difference between what I did to catch Fire Elementals, and whatever fifteenth-level mages leave behind to deter thieves.”
But even as I said that, I reasoned the basic principles were probably the same.
Traps were all about deception and temptation.
Fire Elementals were angry and hungry and liked to roast living things, so we’d use ourselves as bait to lure them in.
Thieves were lured in by the promise of treasure. We were the dumb Fire Elementals.
“If you see something you want to touch, don’t. If it looks valuable, it’s probably there to tempt you. I’ll take the lead. Be sure to only step where I’ve stepped. We’re going to take it real slow. Don’t clump up. That’ll just cause more casualties if a trap gets tripped.”
“Yeah… How about I stay up here and guard the door?” Bognar asked. “You know, in case the monsters come back? Or Morton and the scary girl shows up?”
“That’s a good idea.” Bognar was a big oaf and constantly bumping into things in places where everything wasn’t designed to kill us. Rufus wasn’t nearly as clumsy, but he was a bit of a dimwit, and I didn’t want him curiously poking at any shiny things. “How about you keep him company, Rufus?”
“What? Do you doubt the courage of House Rudnik?” he sputtered, offended. “How dare you?”
“Fine. You can come too, but do exactly as I say and no touching anything.”
“I’ll stand watch with Bognar,” Danny volunteered. “I’m happy with my face remaining attached to the skull bones beneath. Unlike Cousin Fredrick.”
I wasn’t sad to see Danny stay where it was safer. He struck me as fairly clever, and would surely be safer around the rest of us than our idiot dwarf, but he was such an earnest kid, if he died while under my responsibility, I’d feel terrible about it.
On that note, I looked toward my girlfriend.
“Don’t you even fucking dare ask me to stay where it’s safe, Ozwald Carnavon. I’ve got a far lighter step than you do.”
Rade laughed at that. “I’ll go as well. This isn’t my first foray into the dark.”
“Were any of those mausoleums you’ve robbed strewn with traps?”
Rade shrugged. “If they were, I was lucky enough to not step on any of them!”
Azarin was incredibly graceful, and though Rade lied constantly, the one thing he was honest about was being a good swordsman, and he had the footwork to match.
That left me with three more rather large, heavy specimens to worry about.
Trax was thick, but he also had that unnerving Squalo dexterity, so he was probably good at avoiding danger.
I was mostly worried about him eating things he shouldn’t.
But Krachma was a hulking, ponderous brute, and Sifuso was skinny and really tall.
He was normally quick, but the cold was seriously slowing him down a bit.
Having already offended our dwarf, I kept my suggestion gentle. “It might be tight quarters down there.”
Sifuso flicked his forked tongue at me, before hunching over to make himself a little shorter. “There.”
“Krachma can Impervious.” That was the name of our lob’s potent protective spell that temporarily turned his skin impenetrable as a rock. “Can you Impervious?”
“You know, I’ve not been able to figure out any of your earth magic yet.”
“I have,” Azarin said proudly. “Kind of. Sometimes.”
Krachma looked smug at my admitting failure.
“Don’t rub it in… Fine. If things go sideways and start exploding, you two can just turn to stone. Everybody else, be ready to duck. Let’s go.”