Chapter 23
Twenty-Three
It was nerve-wracking, expecting to set off a magical death trap with every step, but at least it was a lot warmer and drier down here. The shivering from the cold ceased and now my muscles were shaking from the tension.
The stairs went down for a surprisingly long way before we entered a large chamber, which must have stretched beneath the ocean’s surface.
The room was a long rectangle, so big, my light charm barely illuminated the ceiling or far wall.
This was the sort of thing wizards of advanced rank could carve out of solid rock on a whim.
As a mere rank one, the construction of such things was far beyond my understanding, but going five hundred years without springing a leak was quite the testament to the skill of the builder.
“You guys stay on the stairs while I range ahead a bit.”
“Aww, come on, Carnavon,” Rufus whined. “It already took us an hour just to go down this far!”
It had been less than half that, and it had taken that long because I’d used the rusty sword Azarin found to carefully push against each of the steps before placing my own weight on them.
Every few steps I’d paused and tossed handfuls of dust to see if the particles would hit anything invisible or hard to see.
Then I’d thrown rocks down to see if they set anything off when they hit the floor.
After those tests, I’d wait a minute before proceeding, just in case any of the traps had a built-in delay.
“Patience, Rufus. This is hard enough as it is without you barking at me.”
“I am no dog!”
Oh so carefully, I started making my way across the room.
I was counting on my old crawler’s charms to protect me against extreme heat and caustic air, which were two of the more common hazards on Fogo, and from what I heard, popular wizards’ traps.
If I was really lucky, any surprises left by Korthican would be in the form of fire or poison gas.
If I was unlucky, they’d be anything else.
There were so many different ways to kill someone with magic, the possibilities were endless, and it would take an incredibly powerful wizard to have defenses prepared against them all.
Trax sent me a thought. “It is difficult to smell, but a great deal of blood has been spilled here. It is all dried out now, but the scent permeates the stone. I would urge caution.”
“Duly noted, Trax.”
There was still a lot of furniture in the room, but it was covered in five centuries of dust and spiderwebs.
All the shelves were empty. That wasn’t unexpected.
The fishermen warned me that so many other adventurers had hit this place over the years that anything of value that could be easily carried off, had been.
I wasn’t the only one to notice the empty shelves and broken open chests. “Hey, Carnavon?”
“What now, Rufus?”
“If this place has already been looted, shouldn’t all the traps have been sprung?”
It was Rade who corrected him. “You’d think that, but if a mage is sufficiently powerful, and the original casting involved even a tiny bit of Permanence, a spell can be discharged, then recharged to go off again later.
Lesser enchantments, like Azarin’s wand or my sword, only have a finite number of uses, but if a wizard uses up a little time magic in the formula, enchantments can last nearly forever. ”
I turned back to point the rusty long sword at Rufus. “Which is why you keep your grubby mitts in your pockets. Got it?”
“Fine…” Our dwarf was getting huffy. “I just didn’t know this part of adventuring would be so tedious.”
That was easy for him to say from the safety of the rear. Out here in front, the pressure was killing me. “I’ve heard rumor there’s spells that can detect traps. You should learn one that does that and save us all a lot of time on our next job.”
“Oh, I’ll do that for sure, mark my words, soon as I find one.”
The floor was a tiled mosaic, though it was hard to tell in what image beneath so much dust. I poked each tile before stepping on it.
I extended the sword to knock down spiderwebs that might be concealing trip wires.
I couldn’t see anything threatening above or to the sides either.
Once I’d cleared a ten-foot square, I signaled for the next Outcasts in line that it was safe to come down.
On the other side of a desk, I found a skeleton.
He’d been wearing some mismatched armor, but the steel cuirass hadn’t been tough enough to stop whatever had poked a jagged hole through one side and out the other.
It had hit him so hard that bits of rib had gotten blasted out and were lying several feet away.
A hit of such violence had probably stuck some of his lungs on the wall, but all the soft bits had long since rotted away or been eaten by bugs.
I picked up one of the rocks I’d thrown down earlier and tossed it at the desk the dead adventurer had probably been searching through. The rock hit a drawer and BANG!
A yellow streak flew from one wall to smack into the other. At the point of impact, the dust had been blown off in a big circle, leaving a smoking crater in the middle of the bare stone.
“See?”
Rufus quickly shoved his hands in his pockets.
From that point on, there was a lot less whining.
I found another skeleton. From the diminutive size, I hoped this had been a halfling or one of the equivalent-size races, because I really hoped nobody had let their children play down here.
The bones were partially crumbled to ash, which suggested fire, acid, or some kind of disintegration spell.
I studied where he’d fallen, what furniture was around, and where it looked likely that something impressive or valuable must have once sat.
There was a little podium that had probably once held a treasure, which was probably the lure.
I went back, picked up an ancient rotting boot from the last dead fellow, and threw it at the podium.
A hungry black mist engulfed the whole thing for a moment, and the half-charred sole fell out the other side.
“I think there’s traps all along the sides where things were displayed, but we don’t have to mess with those.
Carcalla said the secret door would be at the end of the room.
” I scowled at the distance, as there was a great deal of possibly lethal furniture between me and the far wall, while the last fifty or so feet were wide open and bare.
“I don’t like that final empty bit,” Azarian said.
“Yeah… me neither. The rest of this place is cluttered. Why’s Korthican got a dance floor?”
“You know about dancing? I didn’t know you had dances in Fogo. The way you talk, it’s all work, work, work.”
“You’d be surprised. Work hard, play hard. The cargo bay of a barge is wide and flat, and once you drop off the Red and it’s empty, that’s the time to celebrate. We’ve always got a few folks who can play an instrument or hum a tune. Cadre girls love to dance. I’m not too shabby at it myself.”
“You’ll have to show me later.”
Even with the tension, a pretty girl saying such nice things made me smile. “Providing we don’t die horribly here, I will.”
“I’m holding you to that, Oz.”
I set as direct a path as I could for the end of the room. Twenty minutes later, I was a third of the way across. I was surely missing a slew of traps along the way, but as long as nobody strayed off the narrow lane I’d scouted, we should be fine.
Eventually, my compulsive floor-poking paid off, as a bit of pressure with the tip of the sword caused one of the tiles ahead of me to sink.
It was right next to a small table that must have once displayed something of value.
There was a click, and I leapt back as a ghostly arrow shot across the room, about chest high.
Luckily, by me being careful, the only thing that got pierced was the cobwebs.
“Everybody remember to avoid that spot,” I said.
“You’re getting good at this.” Azarin shouted that encouragement from a safe distance behind me. “I can’t lie, this display of competence is making you rather attractive.”
“I suppose it isn’t that different than trapping Elementals. Just in reverse.”
Rade coughed politely. “As much as I appreciate the necessity of impressing a lady, please do focus on the task at hand, Carnavon.”
“Feel free to trade places with me at any time.”
Rade tipped his hat respectfully, and I went back to searching.
Where the furniture ended was where it got complicated.
The tiles here were unlike the rest. They were in a chaotic pattern, each one shaped differently, but all of them were just big enough to place both your feet.
I wasn’t very good at sensing magic that wasn’t Red-based, but the energy collected here was strong enough that even I could tell this whole section of floor was enchanted.
It was like being back home standing before rock that appeared cooled and solid enough to walk on, but which was actually a thin crust over liquid doom, where one wrong step meant burning your foot off.
This felt like that, only death and dismemberment would come by magic instead of lava.
The previous traps had all been next to something that had almost certainly once held an item of value.
If the secret door was on the other end, this whole section was designed to keep thieves away from it.
Maybe I was close enough the password would work?
It was worth a shot. I really didn’t want to try and cross the part that was practically screaming danger for nothing.
I recalled the exact words Carcalla had made me repeat until memorized, cleared my throat, and loudly announced, “At the center of the matter cloud, across all realms entwined, shines forth the beacon. Pray to the gods and saints while the enemies of the Council despair.”
Nothing happened.
“That’s a long password.” Sifuso let out an angry hiss. “Humans talk too much.”
“Did you say it right?” Rade asked.
“I think so. Give it a second. It’s been shut for five hundred years.”
Sure enough, there was a loud grinding noise, and forty feet away, a seam appeared in the rock. It was perfectly visible because of the trickle of white light shining through the new crack. The door appeared to be stuck, but there was certainly something there.
“Hot damn. It’s real.”
“What’s the hold-up?” Rufus demanded. “Go get our treasure.”
“Calm your tits, dwarf. This last part I think is like a puzzle. It’s step on the tiles in the right order, or else.
” Carcalla had somehow gotten ahold of the password, but he’d said nothing about this bit.
It looked like the tiles might have been color-coded once or had symbols on them, but it was impossible to tell now with so much dust, and there was no way to sweep them off without touching them.
“Anybody got a spell that can make a gust of wind?”
All eyes turned toward our lone air-realmer. “Sorry,” Azarin said sheepishly. “Useful as that sounds right about now, that’s not one that I’ve picked up.”
“Just poke them with the sword and see what happens,” Rufus said. “It can’t be that complicated.”
I doubted that very much, but didn’t see any other choice. There were a dozen different stones I could step onto. Twice that many with a bit of a jump. So, I picked a tile, extended the sword as far as I could, and gently tapped the point upon it.
FWOOSH!
I was engulfed in a terrible pillar of fire.