Summoner 21, page 21
“You’re right, Gryff,” Sera agreed with me. “I think sticking together is our best plan.”
“If there’s an aura, should we exercise caution?” Phi wondered. “It could have some enchantments we don’t know about that could get us into more trouble.”
“It’s a risk we have to take.” I shrugged. “We knew this mission was going to be treacherous, but I can’t return to Mistral empty-handed. It just isn’t an option.”
“Then let’s get out of here,” Xan agreed, and she held her hand out to me.
I accepted it gratefully, and the Archon helped me to my feet. Then I brushed off the last remnants of the slime, and my face scrunched up.
“Ew,” I remarked as the goo fell to the ground and made a soft plopping noise against the marble.
“Let me see your hands,” Xan instructed me, and then she pulled my hands in closer. “Look up.”
I looked the Archon in the eyes, and as her amethyst irises pulsed, I felt the pain of the sores and burns from the athenids’ saliva begin to fade until it was no longer present. Once I was sure it was gone, I broke eye contact with the beautiful goddess and offered a thankful smile.
“I appreciate it,” I thanked her, but Xan waved me off.
“It’s what I do,” she said. “No thanks necessary. Now, anyone else with burn marks, step over here so I can remove them. We all need to start fresh and rejuvenate our powers in case something is in fact amiss in the dungeon.”
The other Archons stepped up, and one by one, they were healed by Xan’s magic. Hunnah was the last one to be taken care of, but when it came to the burn on her face, Xan frowned.
“This one is deeper than I thought,” the winged Archon sighed. “I don’t understand why it isn’t healing up.”
“Leave it for now,” Hunnah requested in a quiet voice.
“You… want it there?” Xan frowned at her sister.
“No.” The wolf-eared Archon shook her head, and her cheeks flushed until they were a deep rose color. “I mean, I don’t know. I think it adds a bit of character.”
“Hunnah…”
“Please,” the goddess requested quietly. “I don’t want it to fade just yet. And besides, it doesn’t hurt too bad.”
Xan considered it for a moment and then shrugged. “Okay, but let me know if you change your mind. If we wait too long, it’ll scar.”
Hunnah nodded, and I was curious to know why she didn’t want the burn removed, but I didn’t want to press her. Maybe she would trust me with the reasoning in time, but for now, I would leave it alone.
“If everyone’s good, I’d suggest we get moving,” I proposed, and I gave Xan a sideward glance. “Thank you for healing everyone, Xan.”
“Don’t mention it,” the goddess insisted, and after one more moment of lingering, the Archons and I left the library and headed back to the stairs.
As we descended to the first floor, a lump rose up in my throat. I could only pray that the dungeon would give us answers. My women and all of Mistral were counting on me to learn more about the moon, and I couldn’t let them down. There were too many lives at stake, and we couldn’t possibly get the world back to normal without answers.
I could feel Sera’s yellow eyes on me the entire way down, and I managed to muster up a reassuring smile for her, but I wasn’t sure she was convinced. I knew she would press the subject later, but for now, we had more important matters to worry about.
The Archons and I reached the first-floor entryway and made our way over to the elaborate fireplace that still glowed with Xan’s blue flames.
“So, how do we open the passage?” I wondered as I examined the smooth black marble around the fireplace. I didn’t see a knob or a hinge, but then again, this was the Shadowscape. Not everything made sense around here.
“Like this,” Xan replied, and she stepped forward and plunged her hand straight through the flames.
My eyes nearly popped out of my head, but Xan didn’t seem affected by the heat. She simply twisted her hand, and I heard a click, like a key turning in a keyhole.
Xan removed her arm from the fire and then turned back to us. “Everyone, step back.”
We did as instructed, and then like magic, the fireplace swung open as if it were a door and revealed an entryway large enough for two or three people to enter side-by-side. The inside was pitch-black, and no matter how much I squinted, I couldn’t see a thing within the chamber.
“Wow,” I breathed, and I stood there in amazement for a moment. I’d only ever heard of passages like this in stories, so it was incredibly odd to see it before my very eyes.
“Hurry up, everyone.” Xan waved us over. “I don’t know how long the entry is going to stay open.”
“Coming.” I nodded, and I hurried over to the entryway.
The other Archons followed, and Sera stepped over to me and positioned herself so our arms were up against each other.
“Shall we?” Xan prompted us, and then we began to move down the tunnel.
The passageway was incredibly cold, and the temperature continued to plummet the further we moved. The tunnel seemed to have a slight slant to it, not enough to make it hard to move, but enough to indicate we were headed down below the first floor.
Luckily for us, Xan’s wings gave off enough of a glow that we could navigate without issue, but I found myself missing the normal sunlight back home. The Shadowscape was always so dreary and made me miss the warmth of sunshine. Not that Mistral was particularly warm right now.
A shiver ran down my spine, and then I felt Sera’s arm around my waist.
“Are you okay?” she asked me quietly as her warm body pressed against mine. “You seem a little off today.”
“The whole business with the athenids bothered me more than I want to admit,” I replied to my lover. “I was really hoping we could just… get in and get out, you know? But that was foolish of me. Things are never easy here, and I was dumb to think otherwise.”
“You aren’t dumb,” Sera insisted in a reassuring tone. “You’re hopeful, which is an admirable quality in our current climate. I know how much you want to banish the moon entity. I do, too. I want us to move on from this horrid occurrence and focus on raising our child.”
“Saving the realm is also a priority,” I pointed out to the dark-winged Archon. “Now that I’m officially a Guardian, I have to take everyone else into account as well.”
“That, too,” she allowed. “We shall accomplish it together, my love, and restore the world to what it once was, I swear. You’re the Beastmaker. If anyone can defeat an unheard-of evil, it’s you.”
“I just hope I’m not the evil one,” I remarked. “Sometimes I wonder if everything that goes wrong is my fault, whether I intend it or otherwise.”
“We know you aren’t,” Xan spoke up. “Besides, your headmaster and the Grand Mage wouldn’t have bestowed the greatest honor in your realm upon you if they thought you were evil.”
“I didn’t exactly mention impregnating Sera to them,” I said quietly. “I think it may impact how they feel if I end up telling them. When I end up telling them, I should say.”
“There’s nothing they could do about it anyway,” Utuni pointed out. “What’s done is done. Sera is pregnant with your child, and short of murdering said child, there really isn’t any way to take it back.”
“Don’t you dare say that,” Sera hissed at the snake goddess, and her hands flew protectively to her flat stomach.
“I meant it hypothetically.” Utuni looked over her shoulder and rolled her eyes. “No one’s going to murder your baby, Sera. At least not while it’s a child, anyway. Who knows how it will be received once it’s fully grown.”
“That’s enough baby talk for now,” I decided. “I don’t want to think about it anymore. I just want to worry about getting to this dungeon and looking for anything that can help us.”
“Do you think the entity will require a spell to be banished?” Veopa wondered in a thoughtful tone.
“If so, it’s going to require quite a bit of magic,” Quilla remarked. “Something with that powerful of an influence doesn’t just disappear from a few words. I would venture to guess its defeat is going to require both an immense amount of power and some sort of sacrifice.”
We all halted in place and stared at the skeletal Archon with awed expressions.
“A sacrifice?” I repeated back to make sure I heard her right. “What makes you say something like that?”
“Most intensive magic requires sacrifice,” Quilla replied as if it should have been obvious. “Blood, life force… the magic needs to be infused with devotion so it knows your intent is serious.”
“You speak of mana like it’s a deity,” I remarked.
“Mana is life, is it not?” The petite goddess flashed me a brilliant smile. “My magic ability is associated with death, but life and death are too tightly wound to ignore.”
“This is all getting too philosophical for my liking,” Carth groaned. “Let’s pray the sacrifice is merely blood. I don’t think I could handle the emotional weight of a stronger offering.”
We lapsed into silence for a while as we continued on into the dark.
“Maker, how long is this tunnel?” I wondered.
“It’s long,” Xan remarked. “But if it’s any consolation, I think we’re almost there.”
“Good,” I replied simply.
The rest of the walk continued on in silence, and I allowed my mind to drift off to a calmer state, at least for a while. It was difficult to keep myself from growing worried, but I managed to focus on my breathing and the feeling of Sera’s soft skin against me.
“I think we’re here,” Xan announced, and I snapped out of my haze and straightened my shoulders. Sure enough, there was another entryway in front of us, and judging by the rush of cool air, we were about to enter a chamber.
“Finally,” Veopa sighed, and the other Archons made similar sounds of agreement.
For all of their arguing, I was glad they could find moments to get along, even if it was just to complain.
We stepped into the chamber, and another chill ran down my spine as I tried to see in the darkness. The only light came from the low glow of Xan’s azure flame wings, and even they did little to illuminate the space.
Suddenly, I heard a crunching sound beneath my boot, and my breath caught in my throat. What the fuck was that?
“Xan, could you give us a little light?” I requested.
“Sure,” the Archon called out, and I saw her wings beat in the air as she ascended. She flew to one wall, and after she paused in midair, a torch suddenly lit up with warm flame. The umber-skinned goddess repeated this a few more times, and soon, the chamber was lit enough to see our surroundings.
I looked down, and my stomach turned as I finally caught sight of what I stepped on.
The stone floor was littered with skeletons and errant bones from creatures I couldn’t even identify. Among the mess, I spied skulls, arms, tails, and hands, which told me the bones had once belonged to both man and monster. Chains were littered around us, and I noticed more than one set of shackles were built into the stone floor.
The bone beneath my foot had turned to dust, so the owner had to have been here for a while.
“Some of these bones are human,” I remarked in awe. “But how… how did humans get to this palace?”
“You aren’t the first mortal to set foot in the castle,” Xan replied in a hushed tone. “So many teams of mages have come into the Shadowscape over the years, odds are they had to have made it down here somehow.”
“The skull I stepped on turned to dust, which tells me they’re even older than that,” I observed. “Whoever ended up down here did so a long time ago, long before any of us were alive.”
“Who would have brought them down here?” Sera wondered. “An Archon?”
“I would think the mysterious owner of the castle,” I theorized, and I tilted my head to the side as I considered the scenario. How had humans made it down here? Were they just poor souls who’d ended up at the wrong place, at the wrong time, or had they been brought here by the Archons who existed before my women?
Either way, whoever ended up down in this dismal dungeon had suffered a long, excruciating death. Without the light of the torches, this place was a pitch-black hole devoid of warmth. The prisoners would have died cold and alone in the filth of the Shadowscape without anyone knowing where they were.
I squatted down to examine the bones a little closer, and as I took one of them into my hand, my mind spun out a bit.
The humans who’d been bound to the stone floor had probably spent hours screaming for their teammates to find them, only to find their efforts were fruitless. They were in a place where no one could save them, a place where no one would ever see them again. It was tragic, and I couldn’t imagine dying like that. I’d rather be flayed alive by monsters than die alone as these mages had.
“Gryff?” Sera prompted me. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine,” I replied, and I rose to my feet. No sense in being morose over something that happened centuries before I was born. My sadness wouldn’t bring these people back, no matter how much I wished it would.
“I don’t think we’re going to find any books down here,” Utuni remarked as she carefully stepped over a small pile of bones. “There’s nothing here but dirt and remains.”
“Sorry, Gryff,” Xan apologized. “I really thought--”
“I’m not giving up yet.” I shook my head. “There still might be something down here, we just have to look close. This is clearly one of the oldest parts of the castle. I know it’s gross, but we need to treat this place like we did the library and search every last corner.”
I was about to assign the Archons when I noticed Miralea was facing the opposite direction as the rest of us. The fur of her jet-black tail was bristled and stuck up in alarm, and I could sense her fear through our bond. The goddess stood frozen in place, slack-jawed as her hand raised up slowly.
“Miralea?” I prompted her.
“Gryff,” she whispered. “Look.”
I turned to face the direction she was pointing, and once I saw the sight that had made the goddess stiffen, my jaw dropped involuntarily.
A pair of intact human skeletons were shackled to the ground, their jaws dropped in horror as if they’d died screaming. Each of their wrists had been secured to the stone floor, except for the skeleton on the right, whose hand was free and rested above it on the wall.
I followed the direction of where the hand was reaching, and suddenly, I felt my entire body grow cold.
Above the skeletons was a bright, violent smear of brown that looked like dried blood. It dripped down from the wall to the floor, and bile rose up in my throat.
“Oh, my,” Quilla whispered behind me, and it was then I realized the blood spelled out a word.
AZRANAETH.
Chapter Eleven
“Azranaeth,” I whispered aloud, and I got a sick feeling in the pit of my stomach. I couldn’t explain it, but for some reason, it felt as if I wasn’t supposed to say the word aloud. It felt like magic, something dark and twisted that wasn’t meant for mortal ears, like some sort of incantation or curse. Maybe I was just reading into it and letting my mind wander to strange places, but something about the word on my tongue felt wrong.
“They must have written it before they died,” Xan observed in a hushed voice. “How tragic.”
“It’s more than just tragic, it’s bizarre,” Carth murmured as she crossed her arms against her chest. “Why would they go through all of the trouble? I’m assuming the blood is theirs.”
“Does the word mean anything to any of you?” I wondered, but my question was met with complete and utter silence.
“No,” Hunnah finally spoke up after what seemed like an eternity. “But there’s something about it that feels… strange.”
“I sensed it, too,” I agreed with the wolf-eared Archon. “I don’t know how to explain it, though.”
“Az-ra-nae-eth,” Veopa dissected the word phonetically under her breath, and the moment the word left her lips, she shivered.
“Whatever the word means, it holds weight,” Utuni observed. “I agree with Hunnah. Whatever ‘azranaeth’ is, it can’t be a good thing.”
“Miralea?” I prompted the goddess as she remained frozen in place. Her arm remained out in front of her, and her sudden paralysis began to scare me. I’d never seen her look so frightened before, and I wasn’t sure how to put her at ease when I was hardly comforted myself.
Before I could repeat her name, Utuni stepped over to Miralea, carefully lowered her sister’s arm back down, and affectionately wrapped her own arm around the jaguar Archon’s shoulder. Miralea’s lower lip trembled before she wrapped her arms around the snake goddess and pulled her into an embrace. I half-expected Utuni to ridicule the Archon for such a display, but she comforted her instead and stroked her long, dark hair.
“I don’t want to be here,” Miralea whispered. “None of us belong in this dungeon, and none of us were meant to see that word.”
“Miralea, we have to check this out,” I urged her. “I know you’re scared--”
“Why aren’t the rest of you?” she interjected loudly as she pulled away from Utuni. “I know I teased earlier, but I didn’t know until we stepped foot in this place that something was amiss. We aren’t meant to be down here, master.”
“What makes you think we weren’t intended to see it, Miralea?” I pressed.
“This dungeon has been hidden away for who knows how long,” she replied as her orange eyes flashed with frantic energy. “Clearly, no one has stepped foot in this chamber for a millennium, if not longer. Whatever occurred down here was not meant for our eyes. The lack of light makes it clear enough. Please, master. We need to leave. Can we return upstairs?”
Miralea’s full lower lip trembled, and I could see her tanned arms were covered in gooseflesh. The Archon was really shaken up by this message on the wall, even worse than the rest of us.
I took a deep breath. We were in too deep to leave now, and while I knew something was wrong with the blood message, I had a feeling we needed to stick around the dungeon. Something about the hidden chamber warranted a closer inspection.
