The Hidden Realm: Book 04 - Ennodius (26 page)

“Perhaps they found some other way to escape,” ventured Elerian, for he knew Ascilius was thinking about the fate of his parents.

“They are both dead,” said Ascilius dully. “I knew it in my heart as soon as I passed through the doors to the king’s chambers. They must have fled up here to escape the small dragons, not knowing that Eboria had already destroyed the back stairs. She was probably waiting for them when they came out.”

“We should return inside before we meet the same fate,” Elerian advised Ascilius, for he felt that they were tempting fate by exposing themselves so openly on the mountaintop. Ascilius, however, seemed in no hurry to return to the king’s chambers. Instead, he walked toward the domed pavilion in the center of the platform.

“This vigilarum was set here at the topmost point of Geminus as a lookout point for any danger approaching the city,” said Ascilius dully to Elerian as they walked across the polished floor of the pavilion to stand by the horn. “This horn has spells placed upon it so that its voice will be heard throughout the whole city if it is sounded. Day and night, only the most trusted sentries manned this post, for it was hard duty. I stood watch here myself, both when the bitter winds of winter played about the peak and in the heat of the summer. My father, despite his age, often ascended the king’s stair we just climbed to observe the vigilance of the sentry. He seemed to come often when I stood here,” mused Ascilius to himself, a slight tinge of bitterness in his voice, “but evidently he was not so vigilant with the others who kept watch here. I wonder who was on guard the day the dragon came?” he said quietly, almost as if he was speaking to himself alone.

At a loss for words to comfort his friend, Elerian stood silent with the winds of the heights tugging at his bound hair, observing the vast panorama that was spread out before him. To the south was the burned out valley of Ennodius. To the west rose an endless sea of rugged peaks and dense forests. To the east was a narrow band of high mountain peaks, which screened the rolling plains of the Tarsi from their view. Northwest of Geminus, Elerian saw another valley, also blackened and ruined by fire. Nowhere was there any sign of life.

Shading his farsighted eyes, Elerian looked to the northwest where Galenus must lie. At the base of a tall mountain that rose up at the head of the ruined valley to the northwest, he saw the glint of steel and the minute forms of soldiers, part of a dark army that lay like a shadow around the foot of the mountain.

“Does Galenus lie at the end of that valley to the northwest?” Elerian asked Ascilius quietly.

“It does,” replied Ascilius. “What do you see?” he asked apprehensively, for he was well aware of Elerian’s keen sight.

 “There are is an army drawn up around the base of one of the mountains at the head of the valley,” replied Elerian. “I believe Galenus is under attack.”

Ascilius stared grimly to the north, but his eyes could not see that far. “I'll wager those are the Goblin forces that we saw issuing from Calenus when we escaped from beneath the city. Even then, they were already traveling up the north road to lay siege to the Dwarf kingdoms. If there are survivors in the castella, they are now trapped there, caught between Eboria and the Goblins to the north, for with Galenus under siege, I cannot lead them to safety. Every part of my plan has now fallen into ruin,” he groaned. “At the least, I would have liked to send you back to Tarsius with a fortune in gold and jewels, but even that is denied me. Because of the suddenness Eboria’s attack on Ennodius, all of the treasure in the city was evidently unsecured and appears to have been carried off by Eboria’s brood. I am sure there is not a single gold coin to be had in Ennodius or the castella.”

“Thoughts of treasure are the last thing on my mind,” Elerian assured Ascilius. “As for your plans, our lives are not always ordered as we wish, sometimes to unexpected ends,” he said, thinking of the convoluted path that his own footsteps had followed over the years. “If I had remained in Hesperia as I intended many years ago, I would almost certainly have been captured or slain by Lurco. My capture by Ancharian raiders, unexpected and unwanted at the time, actually saved my life, although the price I paid was high. Take heart, Ascilius. Let us continue with our attempt to save your people.”

“I do not think any good will come of this adventure, either now or later,” said Ascilius morosely, “but to please you who have been a true companion, I will persevere. The only place left to look for survivors is the fortress that stands guard over the back gate.” Ascilius pointed to the northeast where a heavily wooded ridge ran from the mountain to a lesser peak. “There is no need for you to stay with me any longer, however. Let me take you to the front gate. Once you are safely away, Tonare and I will try to enter the castella. If I find that the fortress has been sacked and the people destroyed, I will then attack the Eboria and her brood with whatever weapon I can forge alone in my old workshop. If all my people are dead, then I no longer have any desire to live either.”

“You are still intent on ending your life in some dramatic fashion, I see,” said Elerian lightly. “I think it is better that I remain by your side to keep you from doing anything rash. Come now. Let us stop wasting time. Where do we go next?”

Ascilius stared hard at Elerian. “Still the fool,” he said gruffly. “You will never change.”

Ascilius turned away from Elerian, taking a step toward the stairs. Then, abruptly, he stopped, whirled around, and dashed over to the horn in the center of the vigilarum, a wild look in his eyes. Before Elerian could so much as raise a finger, Ascilius stepped up to the horn and blew through the silver mouthpiece. The floor of the pavilion trembled as a deep, powerful note, pure and sweet, sounded in the air around them and throughout the city under their feet.

“What madness is this?” shouted Elerian, seizing Ascilius by the right shoulder with his long right hand. “You will rouse the dragons!”

“Let them be roused,” roared Ascilius, his eyes now dark and stormy, for his mood had shifted abruptly from sadness to anger. “Let everyone know that the master of the house is home and the days of the dragons are numbered!”

A deep roar that rumbled like thunder suddenly issued from the gates of the city far below their feet. Elerian ran to the edge of the platform and looked over the precipice. Thousands of feet below him, out of his sight, an enormous green and gold shape issued from the mountain. Springing sinuously into the air, Eboria spread her vast, leathery pinions, beating her way swiftly upward.

When the dragon suddenly appeared, the morning sun gilding the edges of her scales with the brightest gold, her beauty momentarily mesmerized Elerian, rooting him to the spot, but then, he shrugged the feeling off. Never again would he willingly submit to the fascination of a dragon. He turned to Ascilius who was now on his left, glaring down at Eboria, his anger protecting him from her mesmeric charm. Red sparks had appeared in the back of his dark eyes, and his powerful fingers clenched and unclenched as if he would battle Eboria with his bare hands.

“Run!” Elerian shouted, urgently shaking the Dwarf’s right shoulder with his left hand.

His words brought Ascilius back to himself. He bolted down the stairs with Elerian at his heels, the two of them now engaged in a desperate race with the rising dragon.

A CLOSE CALL

The fear of being roasted alive added a spring to Ascilius’s step. Despite the fact that a single misstep would spell disaster for both him and Elerian, he skipped lightly down the stairway, taking two and three steps at a time, as if he had suddenly grown light as thistledown. Elerian stayed a half step behind the Dwarf, leaping through the open door to the king’s chambers just as Eboria’s great head rose up even with the entryway. Even as Elerian turned and slammed the door shut, her jaws gaped open and red fire blossomed in her throat. An instant after Elerian shot the lock bolts on the door home, the surface of the door went from black to red as the dragon’s flames washed over it. Elerian felt scorching heat wash over him, and the bitter smell of hot iron filled the air. Turning speedily on his left heel, he sped down the stairs after Ascilius and Tonare. The stairway suddenly shook under their feet, forcing all three of them to stop and brace themselves against the walls of the stairwell to stay upright. More heavy blows struck the peak, one after another, causing the mountain to tremble beneath their feet.

“She has sealed the door,” Ascilius said quietly, but Elerian did not reply. He was thinking of the amused look he had seen in the dragon’s eyes just before he slammed the door in her face.

“This is still just a game to Eboria,” he thought to himself angrily. “She does not in any way consider us a threat, only harmless prey doomed to eventual capture.”

Silently considering how he might strike back at the dragon, Elerian followed Ascilius and Tonare the rest of the way down the stairs. The three companions had barely entered the king’s chambers before the dentire suddenly sounded a warning, producing a ferocious noise more akin the roar of a lion than the bark of a dog. When a vast shadow darkened the windows on their right, the floor abruptly trembled and all four windows exploded inward in a shower of flying glass, covering Ascilius, Elerian, and Tonare with sharp fragments as they threw themselves flat on the stone floor. Eboria’s roar suddenly reverberated throughout the room, deafening their ears. An eye blink later, a sheet of red flame roared through the broken windows, passing over them and licking against the far wall of the room like a vast red tongue.

“I feel like a loaf baking in an oven,” thought Elerian to himself as the temperature of the room suddenly became unbearable. All around him, ruined furnishings burst into flame, adding to the heat and filling the room with dark smoke.

“Run for the door!” Elerian shouted to Ascilius and Tonare when the plume of mage fire died away.

Springing to their feet, the three of them barely managed to stumble out of the chamber before it was bathed again from end to end with all consuming red flames. Scorched and half blinded by the heat and smoke, Elerian, Ascilius, and Tonare ran blindly until they left behind the blazing inferno Eboria had created.

After running out into the boulevard before the king’s chambers, Ascilius sank to his knees, puffing like a plains ox. Elerian gladly sat down next to him. He lit a small mage light, its dim glow illuminating Ascilius's face. The Dwarf's craggy features were blackened by soot and cut by flying glass. Wisps of smoke rose from the smoldering ends of his hair and beard. Next to Ascilius, Tonare lay full length against the cool stone of the street panting heavily.

“You look a sight,” Elerian observed to Ascilius.

 “No worse than you,” said Ascilius still gasping for air as he took in Elerian's singed shirt and smoking hair.

“Your eyebrows are fire,” observed Elerian gravely.

At once, Ascilius began to rub furiously at the ends of his bushy brows, for next to his beard, a Dwarf prizes his thick eyebrows the most. Sensing an opportunity for a bit of fun, Elerian cast a spell with his right hand, sending all of the water in his water bottle straight into Ascilius’s face, holding the clear liquid there as long as he could by bringing it back as fast as it flowed away. Elerian began to laugh silently as, suddenly inundated by a seemingly endless stream of water, Ascilius began to sputter wildly and make swimming motions with his arms.

“Why he must think he is under water,” thought Elerian to himself as he watched Ascilius’s panicked motions with wicked delight. “Where is a fountain when you need one,” he thought regretfully to himself as the water finally escaped his control and drained away from Ascilius’s drenched face.

Ascilius angrily wiped the last of the unexpected moisture from his eyes.

“You almost drowned me,” he shouted furiously at Elerian as he wrung water from his sopping beard. When his fingers encountered the hole Elerian had burned through his beard earlier, his fury grew.

“I was trying to put out your eyebrows,” said Elerian, maintaining a straight face with difficulty.

“A tenth of that water would have sufficed,” roared Ascilius. He glared at Elerian, who did his best to look hurt.

“Such ingratitude,” he said sadly shaking his head. “Next time I will let your eyebrows burn down to the roots. No one will be afraid of you then. The Goblins will laugh at you when you go into battle.”

Pretending to be offended, Elerian rose to his feet and walked away, but as soon as his back was to Ascilius, he began to laugh silently.

Ascilius ground his teeth for a moment and then shook his head. “It is the price I must pay for associating with an Elf,” he muttered. “Remind me again why I allow you to stay by my side,” he shouted at Elerian’s back, as he carefully felt his eyebrows to ascertain any damage they might have sustained.

“To keep you alive, of course,” said Elerian, turning around at once. His face looked completely innocent once more, for he had gotten control of himself again.

“Let us move on Ascilius,” Elerian said, turning serious once more. “We are easy prey for Eboria’s dragonets here.”

“You should leave me, Elerian,” said Ascilius gravely. “We have only just escaped Eboria with our lives, and there may be worse to come.”

“I am just warming to the game,” replied Elerian, his solemn tone at odds with the humor in his gray eyes. “Promise me though that you will not blow into any more horns.”

“That will be an easy promise to keep,” said Ascilius. “A fey mood took me, for it is hard for me to skulk about my own city.” He turned to Tonare. “Will you still accompany us, Tonare?”

“Of course,” replied the dentire who had remained silent all this time, observing the strange behavior of his companions. “I have nowhere else to go.”

Serious and vigilant again, they made their way through the dark, silent passageways of the upper level of the city until they found a residence that they could secure. They saw no sign of either Anthea or the dragon she had distracted.

“She must have returned to her body,” Elerian reassured himself, but he knew that he would not rest easy until he saw her again. “Before this adventure is over, I will have more gray hair than Ascilius,” he thought ruefully to himself.

The shop the three companions had entered had evidently sold weapons, for among the debris on the floor, Elerian found a new sword and knife while Ascilius availed himself of a fine new ax. After climbing the stairs to the upper floor of the shop, they cleaned up before sitting side by side on the hearth of the fireplace to have something to eat.

“We will go down to the stables now,” said Ascilius as they ate. “If the doors to the castella are still sealed, then I will try and signal someone to open them for us. If they have been breached, then we will enter and search the fortress.”

“How do you propose to evade the dragons on the way down?” asked Elerian. “Anthea is not here to help us this time.”

“Nothing could be simpler,” said Ascilius. When they were done with their meal, he led Elerian and Tonare to one of the smaller ramps. With a great flourish, he threw back the bolts and opened the lock. “The city is now open to us, for we can now unlock any of the small ramps that we wish from this side,” he said to Elerian as he opened the heavy steel door.

In this fashion, with Tonare to warn them of any approaching danger, they cautiously made their way down through two more small ramps until they reached the first level of the city where the stables were. As they approached the exit to the last ramp, they both extinguished their mage lights, Elerian using his third eye to guide them through the spiral ramp, which appeared as a dead black space to his third eye, illuminated only by his golden shade and that of his two companions.

When they stood at last beneath the arch of the doorway, Elerian probed the chamber ahead of them with his third eye and his ears, but all was dark and quiet as a tomb except for the soft snuffling sound Tonare made as he tested the still air for any scent of danger.

Ascilius lit another small light, illuminating a portion of the vast, round chamber that encircled the huge pillar containing the spiral ramp behind them. The ceiling was low, barely sixteen feet high and was supported by rows of squat stone pillars. A number of wide lanes led away from the central ramp at the center of the cavern, like spokes on a wheel. Between the lanes were hundreds of stone stalls.

Ascilius stepped into the lane that ran before the doorway where they stood, turning to his right to follow it north. As he followed Ascilius down the road, Elerian looked over the low walls of the stone stalls that bordered it on both sides. He saw the gleam of white bones and a horrifying scene came to his mind. With his mind’s eye, he saw Eboria tear down the doors to the main ramp, scattering the frantic Dwarves who were trying to close it. Then came the high-pitched screams of the ponies trapped in their stalls, their eyes rolling white in terror, sweat darkening their sleek hides. He saw the dragon spring on the trapped creatures, killing one after another as she had slain Ascilius’s mare. Elerian shivered, blocking the bloody scene out of his mind. Ascilius also peered into the stables, but strangely, he did not seem as affected by the carnage as Elerian.

The lane they were following finally ended at the edge of the great circular passageway that circled the outer perimeter of the huge chamber that housed the stables. Set in the curving wall on the far side of the street was a set of double doors, each one at least eight feet wide and ten high. The steel of which the doors were made had a sooty appearance, as if they had been subjected to great heat, but they were still tightly closed. After crossing over to the doors, Ascilius set his right hand on the right hand door, palm side down, and whispered an opening spell. The door trembled beneath his hand but did not move. Elerian and Tonare both started when Ascilius suddenly began pounding on the door in front of him with the flat of his ax, sending one hollow boom after another reverberating through the vast chamber behind him.

“You will bring Eboria and all her brood down on our heads with that noise,” warned Elerian, glancing apprehensively behind him toward the main ramp.

“There is no other way to signal those who may be inside the castella,” replied Ascilius, dismissively. He waited expectantly before the doors, but they never stirred. When he raised his ax to pound on them again, Elerian shot out his right hand, grasping the ax handle and stopping him in midstroke.

 “Even if someone hears you, Ascilius, they will only think it is the dragon trying to force the doors,” he said quietly. “We must find some other way into the fortress.”

“There is another way,” said Ascilius reluctantly, “but it is one which I had hoped to avoid. Before we attempt it, though, we must go to my shop on the second level.”

“We can go wherever you wish, but first I think we should hide for a bit in case the dragons heard you pounding on the door,” replied Elerian, nervously eyeing the central ramp.

“Perhaps you are right,” said Ascilius thoughtfully. “There is a place nearby which will serve our purpose.”

Turning to his right, Ascilius began walking down the curving street ahead of him, Elerian and Tonare falling in beside him.

“The locked doors mean that at least some of my people must have gotten out of the city,” said Ascilius to Elerian, sounding almost cheerful “They must have taken a fair number of ponies with them, too, for I noticed, as we walked through the stables, that there were far fewer skeletons in the stalls than there were ponies stabled down here. There are also many wagons missing,” he continued, pointing to an extensive, empty space between the stalls on their right. “My people must have taken them into the fortress along with the ponies. I have begun to hope again that at least some of the Dwarves of Ennodius might still be saved.”

“Let us hope for the best while also preparing against the possibility of further setbacks,” Elerian advised Ascilius, trying to take a middle course between the extremes of emotion that plagued his companion.

When they reached the eastern edge of the stables, they came to a rough opening on their left that was at least twenty feet wide and sixteen feet high. From his passage through the lower levels of Calenus, Elerian knew that this opening led down into the mines.

Ascilius paused just inside the entryway. The tunnel in front of him was filled with an inky darkness, which seemed to swallow up his tiny mage light. Cold draughts welled up out of the opening, drawn from the bowels of the earth. Ascilius called out softly, but there was no response. Elerian thought he heard the pad of soft feet in the depths below, but he could not be certain. He had a sudden conviction that there was some danger lurking down there in the darkness.

“I would not like to meet another lentulus here like we did under Calenus,” he thought to himself as he reluctantly followed Ascilius into the shaft.