Seeker of Legends (Fate of Legends Book 2), page 11
He repeated the same process he’d used last time, going down the right path, his hand on the wall as he did so. Again, the fear…and the farther he went, the more intense it got.
Wrong way…shouldn’t have gone this way.
He felt a sudden, powerful sense of regret, and stopped in his tracks, doubling back. It had to be someone else’s memory, absorbed into the wall. He continued down the left hallway, doing the same as before. Fear…but less intense. This had to be the right way.
The path took a left turn, then another, and suddenly the hallway opened up, the leftmost wall ending, replaced by another pitch-black pit. Hunter paused, kneeling at the edge of the pit and lowering his lantern into it.
Below – far below – he could barely make out something. Orange light reflecting off row after row of…things. He peered at them.
They were spikes. Long, very sharp, spikes.
He stood, backing up quickly. Looking up, he saw only blackness.
There was a sudden rumbling sound to his right.
He turned toward it, seeing the wall there. Something was wrong. Very wrong.
It was moving. Toward him.
He stared at the wall, watching in disbelief as it inched toward him…and the pit. Watched as the ledge he was standing on steadily narrowed.
“Oh come on!” Hunter complained. He shoved his shoulder against the wall, but it was no use…it kept moving, pushing him toward the pit…and the deadly spikes far below. He was forced to take a step back, then another, until one of his heels was hanging over the edge of the platform.
Shit!
Turning to face the wall, he held his sword flat against it, shoving the hilt into the wall with one hand, and the flat of the blade with the other. He dug his boots into the floor, pressing against the wall with every bit of his strength. But it was hopeless…the wall continued to shove him backward, slowly but surely, toward the spike-laden pit behind him.
He was forced to take a step back with his other foot, both of his heels hanging off the ledge now.
Hunter cried out, pressing his whole body against the wall now, his temple shoved against the cold steel of Vi’s blade. He felt the wall press forward, felt one of his feet slip off the platform. He squeezed his eyes shut, knowing that he was about to die.
And then the wall seemed to vanish.
He stumbled forward, catching his balance and opening his eyes.
The wall was five feet away from him, the platform he stood on back to its original width. He looked down, realizing he was standing at the very edge of it, inches away from falling into the spiked pit. He swore, stumbling forward and pressing himself against the wall, half-expecting it to start moving again.
And then it did.
He braced himself, then froze.
Your sword!
Lifting it up, he pressed the flat edge of the blade against his forehead, ignoring the wall. Moments later, it stopped moving, instantly returning to its original position.
Holy shit.
It’d all been an illusion. He’d forgotten about keeping Vi’s sword against his head, and had nearly thrown himself into the spiked pit. If he hadn’t pressed his temple against the blade at the last minute by accident, he’d be dead.
God damn.
He stood there, sweat pouring down his sides, his heart pounding in his chest. He swallowed in a dry throat, knowing that he was alive only through sheer, dumb luck. The urge to go back – to leave this god-forsaken place – nearly overwhelmed him.
Calm down, he told himself.
He waited, taking deep breaths in, then letting them out slowly. His heart gradually slowed, the terror easing. He kept Vi’s blade against his head, absorbing its calm. Vi’s calm.
Then he steeled himself, continuing forward down the platform.
It wasn’t long before he saw something in the pit to his left…large stone columns rising from the darkness. He followed them upward, seeing that they were supporting a narrow platform one story above. It was, he realized, the platform he’d seen earlier, near the entrance to the tomb…the one the stairs had led down to. He could only imagine what awful delusions had been absorbed by it, to make an unwitting victim leap to their own death. Lady Camilla had mentioned that the men who’d attempted to enter the Crypt of Zagamar had all gone mad. Perhaps this Zagamar had forced actual madmen – men with schizophrenia, or some other delusional disorder – to stay here. The stone walls would’ve absorbed their madness, transferring it to anyone that passed near.
That explains the narrow platforms and hallways, he deduced. It forced people to stay near the walls. Absorption required proximity and duration; that explained all the intersections. Each time someone went the wrong way and had to double back, it increased the duration of exposure.
Clever bastard, this Zagamar.
He continued forward, and eventually the platform ended in a sheer stone wall ahead. To the left, over the pit, was a narrow staircase spiraling downward. It was the only way to go, unless he wanted to turn back. But he had a feeling this was the right way. How he knew that, he could only guess…but he’d learned to trust his intuition. More often than not it was absorbed memories that were guiding him. He’d be a fool to ignore them.
Hunter followed the stairs downward, making sure to stay as far away from the edge as possible. The stairs spiraled downward, bringing him down through the floor of the spiked pit. He paused to study the spikes on the way down; they were a few feet long and made of rusted steel. There were more than a few bones wedged between them.
Could have been me, he thought with a shudder.
He continued down the spiraling staircase, descending into another room one story below. The floor of the spiked pit was the ceiling of this new room; peering through the darkness, he saw an irregular, rocky floor at the bottom of the stairs. Bones were strewn across it, almost as thickly as they’d been outside the crypt. He slowed, stopping a few steps above the bottom of the stairs, holding his lantern ahead of him and peering into the darkness.
An endless sea of bones littering the floor, and nothing else.
Keeping Vi’s sword against his forehead, he stepped down from the last of the stairs, bones crunching under his boots. The air was thick with dust, tickling his nose. He sneezed, trying to hold it back for some reason, but failing. A silly attempt…there was no one here to hear him after all.
No one alive, anyway.
He strode forward, careful not to trip over the bones as he went. So many bones, extending as far as the lantern’s light allowed him to see. Still he walked, until he spotted a wall ahead. There were bones there as well, embedded into the stone.
Human bones.
Hunter stayed well clear of the wall, hardly wanting to suffer whatever influence those bones might have on him. The ones at his feet were far away from his head – much farther than Vi’s sword, at least – which was probably why he couldn’t feel their influence. Or not very strongly, at least; he did feel a slight trepidation.
Dust tickled his nose, and he sneezed again. The sound echoed through the large chamber.
The wall extended to the left and right as far as he could see, vanishing into the darkness beyond. He decided to go right, walking parallel to the wall, staying a few yards away from it. It curved to the left as he went, ever-so-slightly. He followed the curve, his boots crunching on the bones underfoot.
Seconds passed, then minutes. Still the wall curved, ever-leftward.
How big is this damn room?
Hunter walked for few more minutes before stopping and staring at the wall, a frown on his face. He’d been walking for at least a quarter mile, if not a half-mile. There was no way the room could be that huge. He inspected the wall more carefully; there were occasional symbols carved into its surface, one every few yards. A skull, a heart…the anatomical version, not the standard Valentine’s day one. He strode forward, spotting another symbol, at eye-level: a brain.
Hunter resumed walking, still following the wall, but studying its surface. More symbols…a human hand. Then a tree. A man standing in water, his arms raised to the heavens. Long, spindly arms, with long, thin fingers.
Onward he went.
There were fewer carvings now, spread farther apart…and never repeating. A book. A crowd bowing before the same long-limbed man. And then a long stretch with no symbols at all.
Huh.
A minute passed, and then he spotted something familiar…a carving of a skull. Then a heart.
He slowed, then stopped. The symbols were identical to the ones he’d seen before. Beyond them, he spotted a symbol of a brain. At eye-level, just as before.
I’m going in a circle, he realized.
He shook his head, kicking himself mentally. Of course he was…the wall was curving to the left…and that meant it was making a circle. A huge circle. Which meant that this room had a huge circular wall in the center of it, and he was just going around and around it. There was no way to get inside the circle that he could see. Maybe if he followed the exterior wall of the room, he might find a way forward.
Hunter turned away from the wall, walking perpendicular to it. It wasn’t long before he came to another wall…flat, not curved. He turned left, following perpendicular to it. Eventually it ended at a ninety-degree angle, turning left. He turned with it, coming to another left-turn a minute later. He repeated this a few more times before he realized that he was going in circles. Or rather, squares.
Well shoot.
He stopped, thinking it through…and ignoring a constant, low-level anxiety that had gripped him ever since he’d descended into this room. As far as he could tell, the room was a huge square, with a walled-off circle in the center of it. He’d only spotted one staircase going up, which was the one he’d come down through. That meant that this room was a dead end.
But it felt like he was going the right way. What was he missing?
He walked back to the circular wall in the center of the room, studying the surface of the wall more carefully. There were occasional bones embedded into the surface, and the symbols he’d seen before. Glancing upward, he noticed that the wall was curving away from him as it went up, vanishing into the darkness high above his head. He held his lantern higher, but still couldn’t see where the wall met the ceiling. But it was pretty clear that the wall wasn’t just a wall.
It was a dome.
Why would they put a dome in the center of a room?
The dome was huge, of that he was certain. Maybe sixty feet in diameter, or perhaps even bigger. He looked down, noticing that the skeletons lying on the floor were piled up a bit higher at the perimeter of the dome.
Strange.
He switched his sword to his left hand, his lantern to his right, giving his right shoulder a break…but making sure to keep Vi’s blade against his forehead, so that he could continue to absorb…
His eyes widened.
Memories!
He stepped closer to the dome, kneeling and setting his lantern on the floor. Then he reached out, picking up a skull. He hesitated, then set Vi’s sword aside, lifting the skull until it pressed against his forehead. He closed his eyes.
Images of men sitting all around him. Men with grotesquely gaunt faces, their eyes sunken into their skulls. More men lying dead on the floor, looking for all the world like skeletons save for a thin layer of flesh draped over their bones.
He looked down, seeing his own bare belly, ribs and the bones of his pelvis clearly visible. His clothes barely held up by a long piece of cloth wrapped around his emaciated waist. He was holding a knife, and crouching before a young, emaciated man lying on the floor, one too weak to move anymore. The man stared up at him, his eyes wide with terror.
He held the man’s arm down by the elbow, plunging the knife into his bicep, severing the tendons securing it to his bones.
The man screamed, a pathetic mewling that echoed through the room.
He ignored the sound, freeing the hot, bloody muscle, then bringing it hungrily to his lips.
Hunter eyes snapped open, and he jerked back, dropping the skull and bolting to his feet.
Jesus!
He looked down at himself, relieved to see his own body again. Then he gazed at the countless skeletons on the floor, a chill running down his spine.
They all starved to death.
His eyes went to the dome in front of him, and he knew – without knowing how – that there was a way inside. That the man who had built this crypt was inside of the dome. The man who had trapped him…trapped these people, rather…inside of this cursed tomb.
Zagamar.
But these people – whoever they’d been – hadn’t known the way inside the dome. And the double-doors far above – at the entrance to the crypt – had been sealed shut when these people died. A memory of countless men crowded by those doors, pounding on them, came to him. Screaming for someone to open them.
They’d been tricked. Left to die with their master.
Hunter shook the memory away, knowing it was not his. He couldn’t help but picture the bones piled high against the doors at the entrance to the crypt, the ones he’d had to wade through.
Goosebumps rose on his arms.
He took a deep breath, letting it out…then quickly retrieving his sword and pressing it against his head. He stood there, considered his options. It was clear that these people – these skeletons – on the floor hadn’t know the way into the dome. But someone must have. The question was, who?
He stared at the wall, his eyes resting on one of the symbols there.
A brain.
Hunter hesitated, then stepped forward, stopping a foot from the wall. He reached out with his free hand, touching the symbol and waiting.
Nothing.
He leaned in then, lowering Vi’s sword and pressing his forehead against the symbol. The stone was cool and dusty, and he stifled another sneeze, holding his breath.
Sudden, intense despair…and nothing else.
Hunter took a step away from the wall, bringing Vi’s sword back up to his forehead.
Well shit.
Frustration mounted within him, and he resisted it, trying to think. There was no point in getting upset…that would be a waste of time.
He glanced to the left, spotting another symbol on the dome…the skull. There was something very familiar about it. Which wasn’t surprising; he’d seen it before, after all. But still…
He walked up to it, pressing it with his left hand. The symbol sank inward a fraction of an inch, forming a small circular depression.
Click.
“All right,” he murmured, smiling to himself. “Now we’re getting somewhere.”
He glanced at the symbol of the heart, then the brain, walking up to the latter and reaching out to touch it. But something didn’t feel right; he lowered his hand, continuing rightward, following the perimeter of the dome. The next symbol was of the man standing in water, then the one of a hand. He touched the latter, then pressed on it. Another click.
Continuing rightward, he saw the next symbol, the tree…and passed it. Again, it didn’t feel right. Next was the symbol of the book. An open book, tiny symbols etched into the pages. His hand hovered over it.
Nope.
The last symbol was the crowd worshipping the man; he passed this, circling around again. At length he came back to the symbol of the skull, then the heart. Then the brain. He hesitated, staring at the last one, sliding his fingers over it. This time, it felt right. He pressed on it.
Click.
“Two more,” he murmured. And he knew without a doubt that he was right. He walked leftward this time, circling back to the symbol of the man standing in water, and pressing on it. Another click. He immediately went rightward, stopping at the symbol of the crowd worshipping the man and pressing on it.
Click.
A deep, low rumbling sound echoed through the darkness, the floor vibrating under his feet. Dust fell from the ceiling, sliding down the dome walls and covering Hunter from head to toe. He took a step back, pulling the neck of his shirt up to cover his mouth. Even so, he coughed, the musty air irritating his lungs.
Then the rumbling stopped.
Hunter stared at the dome, his eyebrows furrowing.
Now what?
Something had happened, that was certain. Something had moved. But what?
He resumed walking, circling around the dome slowly, lighting the way with his lantern. It was eerie, being surrounded by darkness, and complete silence, save for his own breathing. If it hadn’t been for Vi’s presence – through her sword – he was sure he’d have gotten claustrophobic.
Eventually he spotted something: passage through the dome. One that hadn’t been there earlier. It was three feet high, and just as wide. He stopped before it, kneeling down and peering through. The lantern light illuminated a stone floor beyond in a narrow ray; the floor sloped sharply downward. It was too dark to see much further. He hesitated, glancing back, seeing only darkness.
“Guess I don’t have a choice,” he grumbled.
He got on his hands and knees, crawling through the opening. The dome was a full foot thick; he passed through the small passage, standing up on the other end. He raised his lantern, taking in his surroundings.
He was in a large, domed room. The lantern-light allowed him to see twenty or so feet ahead…not enough to take in the whole room at once. The walls of the dome curved upward, eventually obscured by darkness, making it impossible to see the ceiling. The floor sloped sharply after a few feet; beyond that, he spotted something rippling…a pool of dark, murky water. The air was terribly muggy, in stark contrast to the dryness of the rest of the crypt.
Hunter peered ahead, seeing the pool extending forward as far as he could see. Beyond that, there was darkness.
He turned rightward, circling around the perimeter of the pool. Eventually he spotted the same doorway ahead…the one he’d come through. Nothing else…except for the large pool. Which meant that if there was anything in here, it had to be in the center of the pool.
Alright then, he decided. Time to get wet.
