078 – Steven Goes Exploring

Steven felt the world spin around him, then stabilize. As he regained his equilibrium, he took stock of where he was. He stood in the middle of a disused road at the edge of a forest. Before him stood the ruins of a city wall and gates, with a ruined city visible beyond.

The city ruins were sun bleached stone, much of it still standing, with debris scattered around. Though ruined, much was intact, and even usable and rebuildable. The most disconcerting thing was the lack of any vegetation. There was not any on the buildings, none on the ground, none where it would be expected. More so, nothing smelled as expected.

The surrounding area looked like a lush forest. Applying what he had learned of how the people on this planet built their cities, Steven guessed that this city had been in ruins for some time, not having listened fully to the conversation between Caspian and Verigan. He had landed on a road in the farmlands outside the city. But the forest went right up to the edge of the urban structures. Trees as thick around as Steven was stood about, with some of the outer structures showing the scaring of small seasonal forest fires. The forest itself smelled as a forest. Once he crossed into the line into the city, the smell changed. It was almost sour, not the rich rottenness of a swamp, for there was no excessive moisture here. It was not dry like a desert, for this climate felt like Nebraska did in the early summer, when they went for summer vacation to Rox’s grandparents. But the smell was not fresh, not living. Nor was it rotten of death and the decay prior to starting the cycle of life over. It was a stale smell, of stasis.

As Steven walked through the ruined city, he could come to no conclusion whether the city was ruined by both war and time. There were dried bones here and there, but anything of worth had long gone to dust or scavengers.

He looked at the sky and noticed that the sun was farther west across the sky, and higher from the southern horizon than it had been in the elf city. So he was some distance east and south of Shalaia, and had less daylight to work with for the moment. As he scanned the sky Steven noticed the moons for the first time in a while. One of the Twins was in the first half of its cycle, and on its downward arc to the western horizon, so the other would probably be rising on the eastern horizon in the waning half of its cycle, shortly after lunch time. The largest moon waning past full, and smallest one a waxing crescent, were also past their zenith, and due to set in the early afternoon. One thing this told Steven was that he would have a comparatively dark evening, and the moons would rise about and past the middle of the night.

Steven walked along the road from outside the city through the walls. The gates were missing their doors, even the hinges had been prized from the stone. The road Steven traveled continued more or less straight to the fortress castle in the center.

“Find The King. Take his sword as your own.”

Simple enough instructions, Steven thought to himself, ruefully. First: Size up the Fortress. Second: Find a place to camp.

Steven figured The King to be in one of three places: in a tomb; in the throne room; or in his chambers. Barring those it would take a methodical search of the whole place that might be better done by an archaeologist. All of which meant searching the whole castle. Steven figured he was most probably in the tomb, most likely somewhere under the fortress. But he had no idea how to get in. He did not relish the idea of searching a catacomb for a dead body, no matter how old.

After looking the area over, Steven decided that this dead city had been besieged and destroyed, and remembered Verigan saying something along those lines. But the fortress near the center had withstood the siege, and then surrendered. The city was in general ruins; the walls of the fortress were scarred but were hardly breached. Also the doors were again missing down to the hardware. While it marked the work of an army looting and prizing a city, it could be the work of scavengers.

After walking the circumference of the fortress, picking his way through the rubble of the city and fording the rivers that fed and drained the mote, Steven decided that other than the dead inhabitants of the city and assorted bugs he was alone here.

Skeletons were strewn about the area where they had been stacked ages ago. The victors had removed their dead and stripped the losers of anything valuable. Women and children were mixed with the men, families fighting and dying side by side.

After spending the remaining sunlight exploring the ruined city, Steven set up camp in a building facing the largest fortress gate. He built a fire using old dry rotted timbers, and broken up furniture and watched the night gather around him. When sleep finally came it was uneasy, as dreams of battle filled his rest.

He was a shopkeeper, recently married with an infant daughter. His wife came down from the rooms upstairs, carrying their daughter bundled in a sling inside her coat. The invaders were very close, but there was nowhere to run. Why had not The King surrendered, or done anything to fight the siege? That was not for answering now. There were some invaders outside on the road now, with their bloody weapons and armor. They went into the shops across the street. He grabbed the short sword the constable had given him, and started to follow his wife out the back. But it was too late. She did not have time to try to fight the soldiers coming in that way, and it was too small an area. Then a spear was protruding through his wife’s back, on the side with the baby. He screamed, and moved around her to get at her attacker as she fell lifeless. He blocked the spear aside, and drove the man back, pushing him into his companions. He shoved his sword through the shield, running the soldier through. Then they were out the back door. There were other dead and dying back here. He tried to pull his sword out of the soldier but was too late, as another spear pierced his side, right through his chest. The pain was momentary, and followed by dark.

The dream ceased.

He was a soldier, having been at siege and war for a long time. He was sick of it: sick of killing; sick of fighting. They had been promised that once this city fell, they could go home. He hoped she had not married by the time he got back home to her. For now his orders were to ‘kill anyone armed.’ That had turned into ‘kill everyone.’ They did not even spare the children, much as they wished to. The defenses had collapsed and his platoon was marauding toward the fortress. They were working the back alleys, to support the groups that were using the main streets. The wooden parts of many of the structures were on fire, but his group was not bothering to burn anything, as most structures in this area were stone work, and perhaps worth looting. He kicked in the back door of a shop of some kind. There was a woman with a sword. He lunged with the spear, using his shield to block her sword. But there was something under her wrap that was alive moments before he plunged his spear through it and her. The woman tried to hold the spear as she collapsed. A man yelled and charged around her. He raised his shield and the man ran into it, pushing him and his friends’ back outside. The man rammed a sword through his shield, and into his stomach. The pain was incredible, but somehow he kept on his feet. The man tried to pull it out, but the shield would not let go of the sword. The movement of it hurt, and as it slid back and forth it did mortal damage, and its blade was covered in his blood. He collapsed, not knowing why the man had suddenly disappeared. His last regret was he would never see home again.

The dream ceased.

Steven woke with a start. It took him several moments to remember where he was.

Now he understood the bodies that were everywhere. They were the city locals, as he figured. Slaughtered as the invaders moved in. None of the bodies were where they had died, having been looted.

Thoughts of his Marine buddies filled his memory. Steven went back to sleep, and dreamed again.

He stood on the fortress wall watching the carnage impassively. He knew he should be mad, but was really just sad. The Fortress had used up everything they had to fight with. All in senseless waste. The city folk that surrendered were tied up and put aside. Those that fought were given no mercy. The invaders were to the innermost parts of the city. To the mote itself. It was almost nightfall, the siege ending almost as fast as the day. Which was just as well. Troops went into building after building, sometimes coming out wounded. Sometimes not coming out. All because The King lay on his bed and in his senility was content to let the city die with him. As a guard it was his duty to protect The King. But wasn’t it also his duty to protect the people? Many of his fellow guards were asking the same thing. He looked around. It was time to do something. He looked up at the flags above the fortress. Then back at his fellow guards. The only things to do to end this were unthinkable: Kill the King, or lower the flags.

The dream faded.

Steven slept dreamless the rest of the night.

He awoke as the sun came over the horizon, the light bubbling across the ruins, as if hesitant to look on the scene of destruction yet again. Steven made himself some breakfast, and set about fashioning a torch from a long table leg, with oil soaked cloth he had brought with wrapped around the end. He finished the torch and went to the fortress. As he went his mind was consumed with what he had dreamed, remembering the ideas clearly even if he did not remember the images.

He crossed the bridge over the empty moat, careful to avoid the rotten timbers. Compared to the rubble of the city, the fortress was fairly clean. No bodies anywhere. No major structural damage. No rubble, save by collapse from neglect. The layout of the structure was straight forward, from a simple time and mode of thought. The front entry was a hub for the halls that led off to the left and right, and straight ahead. Stairs went up to the second and third floors of the wings. The building flowed with the hills it sat on, and a few wings had levels higher than the others.

Unlike the other places he had been to in this world, the ceilings were closer to the height he was used to. Though the place breathed well the stale smell still permeated, Steven soon acclimated to it and no longer noticed it. Digging a piece of chalk from a spare pocket, Steven started down the hall to his left, intending to conduct a ‘left hand search’ and methodically work his way around.

079 – Steven Goes Exploring 2

He found that every door he tried was either so rotten that the latch came off in his hand, was unlatched, or most often completely gone. The wind had already bashed many to pieces. The rooms looked similar to the rest of the city: the unvaluable things strewn about with a few skeletons here and there, anything of value long gone. As he left each room, he marked an ‘X” beside the door. After a morning of methodically searching corridors and checking each room, he found the throne room on the third floor. But it was also stripped bare. Not a throne on the dais, or a hanging on the walls.

Most of the walls wherever he looked were bare even of hangers. Only the fittings that held the walls together were left. The fortress had been thoroughly looted. Leaving the throne room he entered the area with guard dormitories. But these were also empty of anything but rotting debris. For a moment, Steven thought he could sense the building’s soul sagging in depression, from lack of care and use.

Turning into another hallway and sub-wing, Steven entered a series of apartments. These were different than the rest of the structure, having arched windows and doorways. The courtyard these apartments looked out onto was at ground level here, while being on the third floor from where he had entered. These were laid out with more internal walls and partitions than other sections of the building. Steven soon realized these were divided by public area, sleeping area, dressing area, and access to an indoor privy.

The first two apartments were mirrors of each other, with nothing remarkable about them. Continuing his ‘left-hand search’ Steven entered the third apartment that occupied the end of the wing. This room had a stair case on the internal wall to the immediate left of the door that went up out of the meeting area. The meeting area occupied the left corner of this area of the building and was almost square with windows the length of both outer walls, with a door out opposite the door into the hallway. The room was barren, save for debris played with by the wind over the years. Out the windows and doorway as seen from the hallway, the palace church could be seen across the courtyard. On the last internal wall to Steven’s right was an archway through which was a short hall and then the apparent dressing area. To the left was the archway into the corner room of the structure, which was the apparent sleeping chamber. Continuing around clockwise was a windowed outer wall. A door at the inner part of the last inner wall led to an indoor bathroom that compared to what Rox had in Veradale for its size. The tub, sinks, and stalls were fixed and arranged for privacy. All the doors in this apartment would have been double doors, wide enough for armored men to march through four abreast, or two flanking in escort of a third.

As Steven rounded the rooms, he noticed the courtyard outside the dressing room and privy was significantly lower than the other side of the building. And it appeared to have an entrance to an underground structure. Something about it beckoned.

After marking the wall outside this largest apartment, Steven backtracked to the closest downward staircase and went down two levels, then made his way to the one passage that went out in the direction he wanted to go.

As he went outside, Steven realized that the ground within the battlements had no vegetation on it. There was dirt over the cobblestone pathways, but these did not grow anything. This courtyard looked like it had had several trees but these had been cut and removed, the stumps just moldering piles. Steven guessed this meant the ground had probably been salted, or worse. That way nothing would grow up, and this place would stand as a memorial to the conquerors. Steven quickly found the small hill that was the entrance to the tombs.

The wall of the structure to his left went the length of the nearly square courtyard and over to join the wall of the church about a hundred paces away. On the other side of the yard, maybe a bit more than 100 paces away, was the battlement wall and unseen beyond it, the moat. Looking up at the three story structure two stories above he picked out the arched windows for the apartments, and the ones on the end told him he was in the right place. This was an area he had not seen before, as these grounds were only accessible from within the building, and none of the rooms that might look out this way in the part of the structure Steven had searched had windows facing this way.

The tomb entrance had once been surrounded by a garden. It went down into the ground like a bunker or storm cellar, toward the outer walls. He got to the doors, and found them barred by a large timber on solid hooks. This was very odd, as no other door in the place was secured, with most having been removed. He pulled the bar out and tossed it aside, and pulled the old doors open, their hinges groaning from disuse. Behind these doors a passage about six or seven paces wide went into the hill then descended to a second set of doors. These were also barred. Steven pulled the two timbers from these, and opened the doors. The pungent smell of stale air and contained decomposition assaulted his nose, and caused Steven to gag. He quickly put the timbers in place to hold the doors open, and went back up the stairs and out.

Steven took several minutes to catch his breath and let the tomb exchange fresh air for stale. In the process he tied a bandanna around his mouth and nose to as a dust mask. He readied his torch, and lit it. He then put his gloves on, and drew his sword. Something about tombs spooked Steven, and he wanted to have a weapon at hand. He wished for a battle rifle and N.V. Goggles, but the sword and torch would work. He went back down the stairs and past the second doors. The passage here was as wide as the upper one, and a bit taller than wide. It was carved into the stone of the bedrock. Braces were set into the stone at regular intervals. A wispy layer of cobwebs covered the upper surfaces.

Right past the doors Steven found a sad sight, about 20 bodies decaying like the rest, but these were dressed and still wore what had been finery. The bodies up in the city were just bones. These still had some dried flesh to them, with their clothes over that. About half were guards, still in armor. Steven looked the bodies over. They did not show any weapon marks, but appeared to have died where they had stood. None appeared to be the king, so Steven was not interested in these bodies for long. The six women still had their jewelry, so this place had not been looted.

Steven thought a moment, and then decided to leave everything be. If he wanted it, he could get it on the way out. He checked the swords of the guards. But these weapons were not what he had been told to look for. They were too ornamental. The sword he was looking for was functional.

Steven continued on, his torch in his left hand, his sword in his right. He began using the torch to burn the cobwebs from his path. He found a torch in a wall sconce, and touched his to it. Surprisingly it lit. Steven examined another opposite it, and found it to still have oil in it. So Steven quickly settled on a pattern. He would use his torch to burn the cobwebs, and light the torches as he went. But he left everything else unmolested. He found two doors opposing each other about ten paces in. These chambers were well carved and smoothed. The bodies within were of varying size, mostly adults with a few children, but very old. Steven would later conclude them to be the oldest in the complex. No grave robbers had been here. Many of the bodies were finely appointed. The next several rooms were the same, but of progressively newer age, judging by decomposition. The last room on the right was different. All the bodies here were children. The appointments were more childish in form. There were other children in the other rooms, but this one was full of them.

Again the thought came to him. The elves sent him here to learn of his heritage, as well as get the sword. Steven thought again about the warrior’s heritage: what did a warrior do that others did not? To fight and destroy indiscriminately? No. Thugs did that. To kill people and break things? No. Bandits did that. To preserve peace by preparing for war? Something stuck there but refused to come clear. But he was already a Marine, so why did he need to answer these questions? Steven decided to move on, and just let the answer come. But what did a ruined city, an empty fortress, and a tomb have to teach him?

Here he felt a pang of grief for all the children, and for the parents that had laid them here. One section alone was infants. In this room Steven remembered one reason why he had become a soldier. He had done it so that other people would have the freedom to raise their children as they chose, and not as someone else chose. He wandered the whole of this room. Thoughts of his own children came and went; as did the long dormant memory of his oldest brother. Steven had not thought of him in a long time. His oldest brother had died before Steven was out of diapers: he fell out of a window, shattering his skull. Steven had to flee the room to avoid being over come.

He left the room and it being the last room on the right, Steven turned to his right to the end of the hall furthest from the entrance. Slowly a form began to take shape in the dark. At first it spooked Steven, but since it did not move, Steven quickly regained his composure. As he lit the torches and introduced more light, the figure became more distinct. It was a statue, with three figures in heroic proportion: a man in armor, with a sword at his side; his arm was around a woman in a dress; she held a baby in her arm next to her husband. Her free hand rested on her shoulder where his rested. What did the statue mean?

The statue stood at the end of this hall, where it intersected another.

Looking at the statue, Steven realized that part of why he was a soldier was to defend a society where children did not have to die young, or go to war at the whim of some person. The heritage of a warrior, Steven concluded, was to fight the last war, and go home so that no more children would have to grow up just to go to war. Secure peace so the children won’t have to fight.

Steven put his torch to the cobwebs on the statue, and let them all burn off. Once it was clear, he turned to his left, and went down this passage, and down some stairs. The passage was as wide as the first, but did not have any doors. He went the depth of the rooms he had been in, and the passage went down some more stairs. These went down to the floor of a large hall with its roof lower than the floor of the passage and rooms above.

as tim�� o���g. He looked up at the flags above the fortress. Then back at his fellow guards. The only things to do to end this were unthinkable: Kill the King, or lower the flags. 

The dream faded.

Steven slept dreamless the rest of the night.

He awoke as the sun came over the horizon, the light bubbling across the ruins, as if hesitant to look on the scene of destruction yet again. Steven made himself some breakfast, and set about fashioning a torch from a long table leg, with oil soaked cloth he had brought with wrapped around the end. He finished the torch and went to the fortress. As he went his mind was consumed with what he had dreamed, remembering the ideas clearly even if he did not remember the images.

He crossed the bridge over the empty moat, careful to avoid the rotten timbers. Compared to the rubble of the city, the fortress was fairly clean. No bodies anywhere. No major structural damage. No rubble, save by collapse from neglect. The layout of the structure was straight forward, from a simple time and mode of thought. The front entry was a hub for the halls that led off to the left and right, and straight ahead. Stairs went up to the second and third floors of the wings. The building flowed with the hills it sat on, and a few wings had levels higher than the others.

Unlike the other places he had been to in this world, the ceilings were closer to the height he was used to. Though the place breathed well the stale smell still permeated, Steven soon acclimated to it and no longer noticed it. Digging a piece of chalk from a spare pocket, Steven started down the hall to his left, intending to conduct a ‘left hand search’ and methodically work his way around.

080 – Steven Goes Exploring 3

There were rows and columns of biers arranged across the room with a body on each one. The occasional pillar broke the pattern. There were also alcoves in the walls with slots with bodies in them. Several looked royal, but none looked kingly. The majority were men, many of them in armor. Many were women, a number of them were in armor. The difference of the armored figures was discernible by the breastplates, and how the skirt was arranged. But none were who he was looking for. He continued his clockwise pattern, starting at the relative 6 o’clock, and found some stairs in the relative 9 o’clock. Steven felt to follow these now.

These stairs descended and curved around clockwise into another hall directly below the warrior’s hall he had just passed through. The pattern of the biers was identical, all feet to the dawn, about two feet between columns and four feet between rows.

This was hall less than half full, but had more bodies in it, being a larger hall. Steven stopped as something clicked in his mind. He went back to the stairs. On either side were two guards that looked to be from the party out by the front doors. They appeared to have died here, rather than having been dragged here.

This puzzled Steven.

He abandoned his search to check on something. He went back to the upper hall. Steven then went around the room and found a clear passage at the relative 12 o’clock position for his search of this room. After leaving the hall, this passage came to another set of stairs going up. By this point Steven was sufficiently comfortable that he put his sword away. He continued to light torches as they presented themselves. Steven climbed these stairs. The passage traveled a short way, then turned from carved stone to masonry, and then was closed by large doors, barred on the other side. Steven suspected this was the way in to the tombs from the fortress, probably through the church. But why were the bodies by the front doors instead of here?

He went back to the statue, and down the right hand passage. This one swiftly dropped down a long flight of stairs and turned clockwise, coming into a larger columned chamber. On either side were individual alcoves; each with a large central bier, with two bodies, and several guards standing in recesses. Several had other bodies on other biers behind the front one. The lone bodies looked to be female, probably concubines. Steven moved through the alcoves looking for the most recent one. He continued to light torches as he went, and was vaguely wondering how much fresh air was really beginning to circulate, and what it would do for the tomb, and bodies. He found the last occupied one, but this one was arranged slightly different.

The man was laid carefully down, but the women looked like she had climbed up herself and lay down to go to sleep. The guards were not standing as the other guards in the place were. They were collapsed under their own weight. Steven stopped, and knelt to pay some respects. Then he moved in to find the sword.

He checked around the body, but had no need to search hard. There was no sword here. Steven checked the coat of arms, but it was carved, not suspended. The sword was not here.

Steven looked closely at the coat of arms. It only had one sword on it, and Steven guessed that it probably was what he was looking for. The sword had probably been passed to someone. So where would that person be? And who?

Steven turned, and looked at the guards and queen. Something else was odd. They were not dressed for duty or burial. Rather thy looked to be dressed for a funeral.

The bodies at the doors.

Could they have been a funeral procession that had been killed there, somehow?

Steven checked things over once more. Then he went back to the front doors. There was a noticeable low level inward breeze, and higher level outward one. Steven looked the bodies over more thoroughly. It was possible that they were a procession. But why here rather than elsewhere? What happened to these people, Steven thought.

He then remembered the guards in the lower hall. He picked up his torch, and went to the statue, turned left, down the stairs, left across the hall and down the next stairs. There were the four crumpled bodies. All dressed as the ones by The King and Queen, and the front doors. None wore functional swords.

Steven had to find why these guards were here. What was there to guard, or who?

He went into the room. There had to be enough spots to bury a brigade in just this one room. But was the sword here? Steven stopped.

Why was he spending so much time checking this place? Because he had already checked the fortress, and had not found anything there. Steven sat on the edge of a bier, and pulled out his water tube. He took a pull from it, and let the water wash his mouth, than spat it on the floor. He took another pull, and let the tube fall back to where it normally sat. He then pulled out some jerky and chewed a piece of this, as he thought.

The guard’s dream seemed somehow the key. The King had been dying. He had found The Kings body, so he had died. That meant that The Prince would be the next King. But The Prince was not with his parents in the other hall, and neither was the sword. The elves said the sword was here. He was not sure what this sword mattered, but they were adamant that he have this one. The Queen had got on the bier under her own power. There were four collapsed guards with her. There were four collapsed guards here. So The Prince/King was probably here. So which one was he? The one that got on a bier himself?

“They would want it to be find-able by the right person. The Prince would look like The Queen, here on his own and not placed.”

Steven got up and looked at the bodies. Which looked out of place? Where was the last one? That way. Steven went deeper into the room. He most likely would not be on the side. And the bodies would be laid out in order, with The Prince at the end. Steven could see the pattern and moved to find the end of it. Then he saw what he guessed was The Prince.

There were two bodies on the last used bier with several empty beyond it in the row. The bodies were sharing a moment that would last forever.

A woman’s dress was spread across the bier, with more clothes piled on the floor. These dead had nothing on for coverings, and the bodies were completely dried out, and shrunk to little more than skin, bones and hair. Steven guessed that the woman was on bottom, but was not interested in a detailed examination to find out for sure. Chuckling he turned to the stuff on the floor. There was a sword under the piled clothes.

Steven pulled it from the pile, careful not to stir up too much dust. The leather scabbard was stiff, and brittle. Steven pushed the scabbard off. It broke as it hit the ground. The sword was fine looking, though this light was not enough to really judge by. It was light for its size, and well balanced. The cross bar and hilt were bronze or gold, the grip a tight wrap of some kind of wire that provided a good grip. It was plain, with no ornamentation at all. The blade was long enough by local standards to be a hand and a half sword. Double edged and slim, it was purely functional. Heavier swords might give it a bit of trouble, but only for force, not for durability. The edge was well kept, the nicks having been smoothed and sharpened. It might need polishing.

Steven waved it around experimentally, and then the world changed around him.

He stood by the side of his father’s bed, in the King’s apartment. His senile father had lost strength through the previous night and morning. And the city was dying as fast as he was. He would be dead by nightfall.

The old king stirred. He recognized his surroundings. These were his last moments, and as his body shut down, his ghost inside had its faculties set free and at full power. The King looked at The Prince, and told him he loved him and to do his best. He then handed him the scepter in the symbol of passing the title.

The King turned to The Queen. The Prince turned away and left. He had some desperate business to conduct. His father, The King, died while he was away.

The Prince surveyed the situation. A win was hopeless. So he signaled the ceasing of the fighting by lowering the flags on the rampart. Word soon came back. The fighting would be stopped by nightfall; The King would have to surrender in the morning, and had until then to prepare for abdication.

The Prince sent back word that The King was dead, and would be buried in the morning. Then succession could happen, peacefully.

The scene shifted.

He was in the funeral line. A few priests led the way. He wished his brothers were here to help him carry the bier. But The Queen had secreted them out of the siege, unknown to The King. As it was, the heads of the personal guard were carrying The King, followed by a few more guards, The Queen and her guards, himself, and his wife, and their guards. The concubine/nurse and some courtiers, and a last set of guards followed the family. They had a brief service in the chapel, then entered the catacombs and from there the tombs. They crossed the hall and up the stairs, proceeded down the passage past the statue, and down to the Hall of Kings. They went to the last alcove, and the prepared bier. The body was set and covered. Seven previous generations of kings lay here, with their wives, honor guards, and a few concubines. A second brief service was held, and the priests retreated. The rest stayed and paid final respects.

The party reassembled, and proceeded out the way they had come. They went up to the main level, past the statue, down and across the Warrior’s Hall, into the passage to the catacombs. At the entrance to the catacombs, the doors were closed. They were barred from the other side. Nobody liked this. The party broke ranks and went back to the statue, and turned to go to the ground level entrance. The inner doors here were also closed and barred. They were trapped.

Then solid blackness seeped through the frame of the door. It snuffed out the torches, and went fast enough to grab all standing right at the doors. The royals and personal guards were at the back, and saw the Black Death spread. They knew now that escape was impossible. But they were not about to die here. The Queen, the Prince and his wife and eight guards turned and went back to the statue. Here they said their farewells and embraced. The Queen and the four oldest guards then turned and went down into The Kings Hall. The Prince, his wife and the other four guards went back to the catacomb doors, hoping to find them open.

A vain hope.

So they went back to the Warrior’s Hall. The Black Death had not filled to here yet. But it was at the top of the stairs. So they went down, and into the lower Hall. The guards took up position at the bottom of the stairs. The Prince took his wife’s arm and led her farther into the hall, to the next empty bier.

“What shall we do, My Husband?”

“We shall die in each others arms, My Queen.”

He reached for the tie of her dress at her neck.

081 – Finding Treasure

Steven returned to himself, and had to catch himself from collapsing. The last three had been in his sleep, and had not drained him. This one used much more energy, as he was awake.

He now knew what killed all these people, and possibly the vegetation: a spell that extinguished all energy. It caught The Queen next to her husband. And these two in passion. But what happened to the brothers? Who were they, and why did they not return for this sword? Especially if it was as important as the elves implied that it was.

Steven took the sword in hand and went to the catacomb doors. He almost considered leaving his torch behind now, as he had lit virtually every torch he could find; but he liked the feel of it. He tried the doors, but found them to still be solid. He tucked the sword into his belt, and went back to the entrance. He closed the lower set of doors, and then climbed the steps. The mid-afternoon light was nearly blinding after the torchlight. He closed the second doors, and left his torch in a sconce to burn out on its own.

Steven then returned to the fortress and climbed to the floor above the Royal Apartments. He departed from his methodical search and went directly to the rooms over the Royal apartments; to no surprise, he found the Royal Offices, as completely stripped as every other room in the place.

Several ideas lingered in his mind, perhaps as residue from the info-dump that was happening while he was here. But he could all but see the layout of the place when it had been in use. By this same means he also knew that during the funeral, the fortress gates had been opened, and the invaders allowed in without a fight. Steven did not think about how he knew things, as it spooked him a bit.

On the other hand things began to make sense, and his early theories were born out. The Fortress had been sacked, but that did not matter. He ‘knew’ right where he was going. And what he was looking for.

Steven entered The King’s office. This sat above the Royal Apartment below, and this room of it occupied the middle section of the outer wall that faced the church. Taking a moment to look beyond, Steven could see part of the city and forest beyond. Turning, there was an unobtrusive slot on one of the side walls, between two bricks. He pulled the sword from his belt. The blade was a dull gray, the hilt a dusty bronze, and the handle most likely knurled ivory wrapped with gold and steel inlay wire. He put the tip into the slot and carefully pushed it in. It bumped into something at half its length, and continued going in pushing that something. As the sword sunk to its crossbar, a panel a few bricks away on the wall opened. Several bricks suspended on an iron door concealed a safe. The door was somehow set up to open on a counterweight. The looters had missed this.

The box was at local average eye level. It was of the usual size: big enough to hold its contents, and little more. There was a double-edged knife in its sheath, a hand span diameter by one cubit long scroll, a sheaf of parchment about one cubit by a half, and a small wooden box. Other than these things, the safe was empty.

The box contained a set of seals. Steven pulled each seal out, examined it, and put it back. Uninterested, he put the box aside.

He then pulled out the scroll. It was brittle enough that he did not try to unroll it. It was put aside.

He then pulled out the sheaf of parchment. It was bound at one end, and looked like a genealogy, but was in a script Steven could not read. There were several ink stamped seals on the top sheet, and one in old wax.

Thumbing through the parchment pages, the script was easily readable and he found he could trace the general patterns from page to page, but not the specific lines. Somehow Steven knew that each king in the hall below, and the extended family with right to succession was in here. Something about it struck his fancy, and Steven decided to take it with. He carefully placed the parchment in his backpack.

He put the scroll, knife and box back inside then withdrew the sword from the wall, and tucked it in his belt. The safe closed as the counter weight was released. Somehow it seemed right to take the sword and the genealogy together.

Steven then proceeded out of the structure feeling that his job here was done. Except he felt a bit let down that he had not fought any viscous monsters, or had to evade any traps. On the other hand, Indiana Jones, he was not. As Steven walked the fortress and city, a sense of loneliness filled him.

He went back to his camp in the merchant’s shop. He repacked his gear, and rolled the genealogy scroll into his bedroll to protect it. He examined the area. The fire was out. His trash disposed of. The sword and genealogy retrieved. He reached for the necklace, and stopped.

For some reason, Steven felt he should go see the chapel in the palace church.

In his searching this morning he had found it, but had not taken much time there, being more interested in other things. Being late afternoon now, he took his things with, in case he decided to camp elsewhere. The chapel was really the only room with any of its furnishings still here. Evidently, the conquerors here felt it was sacrilegious to strip a chapel. While the metal leaf had been removed, the carved wood and stone were all still here. The benches were so close together as to make any Fire Marshal condemn the place. They had a divider down the middle. The benches filled the room to the aisles on the edges. An altar sat at the front, with several other typical religious fixtures. Several large mirrors reflected light around the room to illuminate it. Steven suddenly felt self-conscious and knelt, feeling he should be more reverent toward whatever god this place was dedicated to and respected by.

He then got up and inspected the place. He found several Christian style confessionals. But there were no crosses in evidence by presence or absence. He found a closet that had held either very large scrolls, or prayer rugs. And he found the stairs down to the priest’s offices and rooms.

Down stairs more mirrors reflected light around, but it was beginning to soften. Along the way, he found another privy. The running water had long ago been blocked.

He found the offices, and found one of these barred and the door surprisingly solid. It was barred from the outside, with a wax seal, still unbroken.

Steven felt that whatever was inside was long since forgotten or replaced and lifted the bar. The wax seal broke, and the bar slid aside easily. Steven found the door mechanism frozen with age, and decided to do some percussive maintenance to open it. He smashed the plate with the pommel of his knife, and ripped the mechanism from the door. The door hinges creaked properly, as Steven pushed the old door open. The room was lined with shelves. Many scrolls and books were still here. Also a few wood and metal boxes. Steven opened the largest box, sitting on a table in the middle of the room. It had no lock, just a hinged lid. He found it to contain the same things as the safe did, less the knife. The rest of the scrolls and books were almost too brittle to touch. There was also a large roll of parchment that seemed to contain the same information as the bound set in his bedroll, but in greater detail. Steven found a thin wooden tube a bit more than a hand span in diameter, and slid the roll into it, hoping it would last until the information could be used by whomever wanted it.

Steven spotted one more roll on a shelf, by itself. Within a hinged metal case was a scroll with gilt edges, the case having white metal ends. Being the only one preserved such Steven put it in his bag.

Steven re-closed the door, and the bar, leaving the mechanism guts on the table in the room. He then went down into the catacombs. He did not go far, as he would need a torch. He went back and was on his way out when the thought of money entered his mind.

He was not a grave robber, or a treasure hunter. But he did wonder how much money the rest of this journey would cost, and how they might get more. He found himself going back to the closed doors of the tomb. These dead did not need their jewels, or gold. Taking supplies from the dead was battlefield expediency. And this whole world was becoming a battlefield. That settled, Steven reopened the tomb, and went in.

The torches perked up as he let fresh air in. He decided to take only from the group here at the doors, and not from the properly buried. He still ended up with a bag containing several rings, bracelets, earrings, necklaces, two tiaras and other odds and ends. He looked at one body, and realized that it was dressed in a gold chain mail dress. In The Prince’s vision, the concubine/nurse had been dressed thus. Steven found the clasps, and removed the mail from the remains. She had apparently been wearing nothing else. There was a clasp at the back of the neck, one on each wrist, and one at the back of the waist. The thing was backless, with sleeves that came up past the elbow, and diminished to a small strand attaching to the front panel. He put this all carefully into his bag. Steven then left closing and barring the doors behind him. The torches would burn out on their own, removing most of the oxygen from the tomb.

As Steven had searched the city and castle, a sense of loneliness had slowly overwhelmed him. This was once a trade center. A place where dreams were made. Where children grew up, married, and had children of their own. Now it was a graveyard. The whole city lying in state, until the ages, or someone, erased it, or tried to revitalize it.

He reached for the necklace again, and was about to push the crystal. Somehow, teleporting from the fortress did not feel right, so he picked his way to the gate and outside to the city. He looked at the sun sinking across the horizon, and finally pushed the gem. But nothing happened. Steven was about to push a second time, when the gem started to glow.

The pattern on the metal disk was traced by a glowing line, and then repeated two more times. Steven was looking down at the necklace, when he noticed the dust at his feet begin to swirl around. The spin went very fast, a wave of nausea swept over him, and the world changed around him.

He stabilized himself, closing his eyes while the world stopped spinning. Steven finally opened his eyes, finding himself back in the café in Shalaia. The thinner air was a noticeable shock, and the sunset was red in the clouds above. Caspian stood to his right, watching, and waiting.

082 - Rox's Morning

Roxanne found herself waking in the hotel bed. Reviewing her recent memory, she wondered how she had gotten from the porch behind Master Iver’s shop to here, and how much time had passed. Looking herself over, she was in her own usual sleeping garb, with her clothes laid over a nearby chair as had become her custom. So she had probably got herself here.

Cyrril chirped from the lintel over the fireplace. The little dragon looked at her quizzically.

The light direction and intensity said it was morning. She was scheduled for some fitting with Masters Eklund and Senisith. This was not supposed to be long. Then she would spend the majority of the day with Master Iver.

Rox bathed, then dressed; she had the white off-the-shoulder-gown as her dress for the day. Cyrril disappeared while she bathed.

She put her local underwear and a shoulder less shift on as foundation for the dress.  As she was putting the dress on, there was a knock at the door. Roxanne adjusted the shoulder and sleeve on her right arm. She wrapped the front over her bust and under her left arm, and back around to her right shoulder. The top corner of the panel slipped through the buckle-ring at her shoulder, and back through itself, holding snug. The wrap around panel closed at her right side from under her arm to her waist by a sequence of tiny buttons under a fine flap.

The door was knocked on again.

Rox walked over, adjusting the dress as she walked, to settle it to her torso.

Caspian waited with a breakfast cart, Cyrril on his shoulder. “I thought you might need to be woken up. When you went right to bed before dinner yesterday, you looked a bit distant.”

Rox ushered Caspian in, standing aside for the cart, and then closed the door.

“I don’t remember yesterday evening. Last I remember was being at Master Iver’s, with the Talent, Macsam.”

Caspian had not been kept explicitly up to speed on the goings on, and paused as Roxanne said this. He watched as she stepped over to the dressing area, and used a stool to put each foot on as she put on some slippers that then tied with ribbons up around her lower leg.

As she came back to the table, he arrayed a plate for her, and opened the few dishes that the hotel had arrayed, with the usual assortment of fruits, cheese, bread, and juice. Caspian then held the chair for her as she sat, and then stood aside as she helped herself to the food.

After a moment, waiting to get her with a clear mouth he spoke. “Are you sure you are awake yet?”

Rox looked over the fruit and selected some more. “Yes. I am aware of here and now, but feel that my memories are a bit scrambled. I dreamed in the local language; I remember something about circles and shapes and writing. Also something about fluids, mediums and controlling them.”

“Are you aware you are speaking the local language?” Caspian watched carefully, with all his senses, to gauge her reaction.

She paused. “Am I?”

He nodded. “Yes. With your own accenting to the words, but yes.”

Rox concentrated. “The quick brown fox jumps over the lazy red dog. Mare’s eat oats, and doe’s eat oats, but little lambs eat ivy.”

This was said in English.

“The river ran down hill, through the crags and over the cataracts. You can fish from it.”

Rox said this in the language she had learned in Veradale.

Roxanne then ate some fruit, and started to spread some cheese on a hunk of bread.

Caspian watched. Cyrril leaped and flew over to the window, and started to preen in the sunlight.

Rox gestured to the food. “Going to join me?” She was back in the local language.

Caspian declined. “No. I ate already. I was up before dawn. What are you up to for the rest of the day, looking so primped up?”

Rox swallowed. “First another fitting. Then the rest of the day with Master Iver, and magic practice.”

The fitting was non-eventful. Mostly it was trousers.

Upon arriving at Master Iver’s, he commented briefly on her white gown being a bit more formal than necessary. Once able to get the lesson going Roxanne talked with Master Iver about what had happened the afternoon before, and her lack of memory. He explained that Macsam had transferred, effectively copying, knowledge from Master Iver’s mind to Roxanne. That they were both a bit disoriented was expected. However, Roxanne now had several decades’ worth of magical experience, instruction, and experimentation in her head. Now her mind would catalog and process it, and she could then access it and base her own use on this. It is not the recommended way compared to personal practice but it worked in a pinch, as they had here. As for the language, she had already acquired it once; now it had been written in again, in a more permanent form.

To prove his point, Master Iver spent an hour drilling Rox on various formulas and theories of magic. In retrospect, it was like a comprehensive math final that covered college algebra, geometry, trigonometry, pre-calculus, and calculus, on the second day of high school, and discovering that she could ace every subject without consciously remembering the lessons the information came from.

But Roxanne knew from her own teaching and martial arts training: knowledge did not equal experience. So Rox continued her magic training under Master Iver’s watch.

She stood in the practice room watching him construct and cast a spell. He had a large wood disk on the floor of the room, with about a quarter of his stuff sitting on tables or shelves arranged around the edge of the disk, leaving the center free. She was aware of the mana, and sensed him put the pieces together. First he arranged a container defining the limits. Next the failsafe for bleed over energies. The matrix for the spells final action. Then the energy that would drive it. All this was done by chanting, moving his hands in specific patterns, and concentrating his will to move the mana. And then the disk with his tables and stuff slowly lifted a hand span off the floor.

Roxanne paid most attention to the energies and least to the physical actions. The disk settled back down, and then it was her turn. She had been taught the actions, and words, and had been given a telepathic crash course on the elfin language, in addition to what Caspian had magically done for her. But try as she did, she just could not follow in the path Master Iver was showing. Three times he had worked the levitation, and two times she had failed.

This time, she was going to try a different tact. One suggested by The Sorceress. Roxanne concentrated, not on constructing the components, but on them simply already being.

“Float,” she said under her breath in the Veradale language, focusing on the end result, letting the magic find its own way. Suddenly the room was full of floating objects. The disk was still on the floor, but everything else was moving.

Rox almost panicked, as did Master Iver’s Assistant who had been puttering in the front of the building.

“Try it again. Float.” She mumbled through clenched teeth, reaffixing the idea in her mind.

Suddenly the disk was pushing against her as it jumped to her own waist height in the air, and all the stuff flew back to their places with a clatter. Roxanne felt the power flowing around her, and bending to her will. It was hard to hold, and near intoxicating to feel. She realized that she was holding her hands out to her sides, and formed a new image. As she lowered her hands, the disk settled back to its base.

Master Iver looked around and then at her with evident concern. “Do you know what you just did?”

“I made the disk float.”

“Before and during that?”

“I used magic to float everything else, and then corrected myself to just float the disk.”

“You used force of will alone to shape and hold a spell. Without any buttressing or support to bleed off or control excess.”

“I thought that was what magic was. What you were doing,” Rox replied

He continued. “Magic IS bending the world to your own desires, by your own authority. The ONE Single Difference that really matters between this and having God’s Power, is whose authority it is being done by. Built on to this are a few ideas, among them are these; magic is always temporary, God’s power may be permanent. There are other arguments about the principles these are based on, and why, which lead into a religious discussion; this is not the place for that.”

There were no chairs in here, so Rox stood to attention facing him as he continued his lecture.

“God by His authority said ‘the laws the worlds are run by are thus…’ Magic says ‘that’s fine, will you please do it this way for a while?’ Doing as you did, shaping the spell by will power alone, risks impinging on the powers and realms of God. Most magic users who work this way eventually get intoxicated; overpower a spell, and self-destruct. So there are trappings about magic. They are there for only one real reason – the safety of the spell caster. A lesser reason is the safety of everyone and everything else around the caster. Others will build ritual and rites out of this, and claim in their pride that these are more important. But that is not so. Others, including myself, will say these are aids in focusing the mind and will. That is a corollary to safety.”

Rox interjected. “Do it right and it is safe to do it again.”

Master Iver continued, with pleased tones at her comprehension. “Ultimately it all boils down to individual safety. Now watch.”

He cast the levitation spell again, but instead of just a hand span, he lifted the platform to his waist height off the floor, and held it there, with her standing on it.

He held the spell as he looked at Rox. “Now, use your senses and reason. What is happening, and why with this spell?”

Rox gathered her skirts, hopped off the disk, and opened her magic senses. Still being raw to these senses she had to focus to use them. Slowly they resolved.

She spoke. “I sense energy, mana? swirling about floor level, into a pillar about half the diameter of the disk. This is the levitation part.”

She cast her senses about. “I sense part of the energy is flowing over the rest of the stuff in the room, holding it in place, before flowing into the column.”

Rox knelt, sensing under the disk. “I sense the column spiral out under the disk, and up around its edges. I think this is stabilizing it, keeping it level and still.”

She looked across the disk. “I sense some of the energy holding everything on the disk in place. Then it flows into a column that spirals up off the disk and dissipates out above head level. I am not sure what this is beyond venting the energy.”

Master Iver appeared pleased, and spoke. “Elementary physics; the energy needs a place to go. Also the upper column is pulling the disk up, to balance the pushing underneath. There are two more components you have not mentioned. One is around me, to push excess energy away past me, so that I do not get hurt by any surges. Another is within me, so I can control how high the push and pull of the columns are.”

Rox spoke as she reviewed her own immediately previous efforts. “I just wanted the disk to lift. Then was nervous as I felt I was trying to balance on a ball. It’s apparent I did not do so complex, or as safe a spell as you are.”

Master Iver lowered the disc, and the flow disbursed. For a moment Rox could sense the natural flow of energy through the room without effort. Then like a surge in a river, it was passed and the flow returned to its normal unnoticed level.