The Children of Urdis (Grimwold and Lethos Book 2) (11 page)

CHAPTER THIRTEEN

Syrus crawled on the beach, shivering, every joint of his body a flare of pain. Sea water dribbled from his beard onto the sand, and he felt warm blood seeping from his shaved head. It ran down the back of his neck onto his shoulders. Salt and dirt mingled on his tongue and his eyes burned. He shimmied out of the surf onto the gritty sand of the thin beach, alternately choking and laughing as he did. Fieyar had preserved him. She was not finished with him.

He still had a purpose and a duty to fulfill. He had survived the terrorizing plunge into a cold ocean, an invisible hand raising him to the surface rather than drowning him. At least that was the only explanation he could conceive. He did not know how to swim, so what else could have saved him? He then endured what felt like days clinging to a slimy cold rock as the violent storm subsided. Once the sky turned blue again he chanced grabbing a floating tree limb and riding it to the shore.

The limb was now discarded in the lapping surf and he rolled out of the water onto his back. His clothes were torn and clinging to his body. Nature had stripped him of anything he owned but for his boots and clothes. In the blue circle of sky above, dark clouds slid across his vision and dots of birds began to circle him. Sunbirds would have no mercy, swooping down on his face to peck out his eyes. The thought alone provoked him to crawl again, then to stand with the help of a gray rock jutting from the sand.

A large crack in a red cliff wall hid in the shadows. It was the entrance to Tsaldalr, remembered from the map he now had lost. The pain of losing such an artifact hurt worse than the bruises covering his body. It might still have held secrets, but it was the property of the sea or the wind now. He shambled toward the crack, the cool shadow making his wet body shiver harder. It was low tide and the entrance was easily accessible. When the tide rose, he figured from the stains and shells clinging to the walls that it would be inaccessible on foot. The water would be over a normal man's head.

The bottom of the crack was wide enough for five men, and he slid inside to total darkness but for a thin shaft of light piercing the roof high above.

"Thorgis?" His voice echoed around the chamber. All he heard was the sloshing of his feet through cold puddles and the persistent drip of water. He would need plenty of dried wood for a fire as well as light. Besides, with Thorgis missing his first duty was to locate the reticent prince. Turning to push his way back out of the cave, a voice echoed back to him.

"Syrus? Over here!"

Thorgis appeared across a natural cave that was much wider than Syrus had guessed. He stood atop was seemed an ancient ledge with a ramp that had been carved from the wall. Holding aloft a fitfully burning torch, he smiled. His fine clothes were now ragged, and his right sleeve had been torn away at the shoulder. His hair was matted to his head, aging him to look more like his father. The orange light shifted shadows around his face and splashed light onto the wall behind him, revealing a darker passage.

"You survived!" Syrus began to pick his way across the cavern floor. Shallow puddles remained, but he was careful not to step in any water in case it was deeper than it seemed. Once he crossed to the ramp, he said, "I thought you'd have died for certain."

"I thought the same for you." Thorgis held his torch high and out of the way. His smile changed his complexion entirely. Gone was the pensive, weary man, and now a more innocent, simpler boy stood in his place. Eldegris's sword remained on his back, and Thorgis's ordinary sword was sheathed at his side.

"You were not hurt?" Syrus looked him over, and but for a few cuts and bruises he was whole.

"I was lucky. A bolt of lightning struck at my feet, and sent me flying over the cliff. I landed in the water, and I swear to you some hand guided me to the shore. It was Danir himself, I'm certain of it."

Syrus smiled and patted Thorgis's shoulder. "I took a less dramatic dive into the water, and I too felt as if something had guided me onto a rock. I clung to it until the storm passed."

"There's more at work than we know," Thorgis said. He pointed the torch into the passage. "I found an old campsite beyond this passage. We're not the first people here. There is still wood and oil within, and garbage from the last visitors."

"Then we should see what we can make of this place. Have you started a campfire yet? We should dry out these clothes and be ready for when the tide rises again. We have no provisions now."

Thorgis scowled and nodded. "That storm, I've never seen anything like it. What was it?"

"The Finger of Urdis," Syrus said. "Perhaps the god is jealous we are close to his secrets. He was the prime god of the First People, the Tsal. He shapes his finger into a destructive wind, and you've seen what it does. It is rare but not unheard of for Urdis to strike when he thinks no other god is watching."

"But ...," Thorgis closed his mouth and shook his head.

"What? Were you hurt after all?"

"No, but, I think Urdis himself might have descended in that storm."

Syrus's stomach burned at the thought. He believed the gods still watched their people, but for Urdis to walk the world again seemed impossible. No god walked the world any longer. Kafara and Turo had imitated the Great Shark during the war of the trolls, and that was as close to a god as anyone had seen in ages.

"Why would you think Urdis descended in the storm?"

Thorgis tilted his head and averted his eyes. He reached back with his free hand and touched the bottom of his father's sword. "When we were running from the storm, just before lightning blew me into the air, I looked back. A swirling cone of wind was eating the forest trees and I swear I saw the form of a man moving within it. A glow as bright as lightning filled it, and in that instant the shape was clear. Then I was blinded and thrown into the air."

The words echoed around the cave and neither Syrus nor Thorgis spoke. Syrus had no answer for this. At last he broke the silence. "Show me the campsite and then we will see about food."

The hall Thorgis led him through was wide and cool. The torchlight flowed across carvings on the walls of ancient runes and strange geometric patterns. The patterns seemed to writhe with the torchlight. While Thorgis seemed to ignore them, Syrus wished he could stop and examine them more closely. He imagined all the secrets such carvings might hold. He only now began to realize he was in a place that had existed since the first age of the world, a time when the gods and their people were still young. Here wisdom and history lay hidden for millennia in the shadow of Avadur's grandest city. Had he only known!

They emptied into an even larger cavern with a sandy floor that had worn away in patches to reveal brown stone etched with more geometric patterns. High above, a crack in the ceiling allowed sunlight to spill inside. Perhaps these cracks had once been windows crafted by the original builders. Syrus searched the darkness above, circling in the dank, cool air of the vault. The ceiling must have been over a hundred feet high.

"The campsite is small, and in this corner," Thorgis said. "Mostly junk, but the firewood is welcomed. If I had my striking iron we could start a fire. We'll have to do it another way. I've only searched close by, so not sure what else might be here."

Syrus noticed an outcropping of rock with rough stairs worked into the side. It formed a natural stage that overlooked an empty stretch of cavern that shaded off into dark. Thorgis noted him studying it.

"I haven't been up there," he said, waving at the outcrop. "But beneath it there are old blood stains all lined up in rows, like something was there and had blood splashed over it."

As soon as Thorgis said the word, Syrus picked up the note of blood in the air. It had been a faint, disturbing scent that fought with the earthy odors of the cavern. His memory flashed again to the stories Grimwold had told of blood magic and Amator's creation of a troll army. Had this been the place where he performed such dark magic?

A sudden clank of metal echoed from beyond the hall they had just left. Syrus and Thorgis faced each other at the same time. Syrus's heart thundered in his chest, and he hoped that the sound was from some unnoticed artifact that had been disturbed and finally fallen.

Strange cries bounced down the corridor, sounds of celebration in a language beyond Syrus's understanding. The echoes swirled and collided into a watery mess, and if there were one or one hundred voices Syrus could not determine. He glanced at the torch, and Thorgis immediately threw it into the sand and crushed it out under his boot. Acrid smoke stung Syrus's nose and he closed his eyes in frustration. That scent alone would give them away.

Thorgis drew Syrus's ear straight to his mouth and whispered, hot breath washing over his face. "Should we see who it is? Maybe Avadurians?"

Yet those cries were more delirious and otherworldly than Syrus could ever explain. The sound made the back of his neck prickle. He shook his head to disagree, and then pointed at the outcropping. Perhaps Urdis had descended to the world after all. Hiding from a god behind a few rocks would be useless, yet he could think of nothing else.

The voices died down, but a conversation of echoes drew closer through the black hall. Syrus and Thorgis both had only enough time to slip behind the stagelike outcropping where shadows flowed over them. Syrus squatted low and peered around the corner, Thorgis leaning over his shoulder to watch as well. Syrus had only a moment to glance around this part of the cavern. He discerned little in the bouncing light tumbling from above. There seemed many uneven humps of rock dotting a large expanse of blackness. He could not find an end point or exit. He might have backed himself against a wall for all he knew.

Six tall, slender men entered into the shaft of light. They wore polished armor fashioned with both plate and chain and carried metal shields designed like sea shells. Long, fine hair of pale yellow or dirty white hung from beneath their simple helmets. From this distance, their faces were no more than caricatures of a thin man's face--shadows making black lines and dots of their features.

They seemed as awestruck at the scale of the cavern as Syrus had been, each one silently looking up into the black. Their muttered words echoed and Syrus held his breath. If he could hear them this sharply, how well would his own motions be heard?

Thorgis had not been as insightful and now withdrew to the side, his shoulder scraping the rock and loosening grit to fall over Syrus's shaved head. The six men turned toward the sound. Syrus remained frozen, watching, wondering if the men staring at him could find him in the shadows. He grabbed Thorgis's leg to halt him, and the prince drew still. No one, not him nor the six men, moved.

The strange men stared into the darkness. Then one held something aloft. It was a chain shirt.

"Little dog," said the man holding the heavy chain shirt in one hand as easily as a dish rag. "Come fetch your belongings."

The laughter that echoed from his companions was as cold and dank as the draft moving through the cavern. Syrus ducked behind the rock outcropping, staring up into Thorgis's shadowed wide eyes.

He whispered, "We're in trouble."

CHAPTER FOURTEEN

Kafara slouched against the cold stone wall, weary and sleepy. She remembered trying to stand, then slipping down the wall until she sat on the floor. Through slit eyes she watched Turo struggle as well. He sat opposite of her in a circular room, leaning against a stone brick wall. His gray wool shirt was torn at the shoulder, and the sleeve hung limp around his hand. His head had flopped forward and his dark hair fell over his face. He seemed unable to raise his head any longer.

The room was plain gray slate, cold and echoing, smelling of dust. A vague yellow light emanated from a spot on the ceiling, part of the ancient enchantments of ... where? Kafara could not remember where she was or the reason for her crushing weariness. She had been enraged, this much she remembered. There had been an argument, and a struggle. She peered at Turo again. His bare feet peeked from a plain brown robe, and drops of blood splattered the cuffs. It was not his blood.

The room was featureless but for two stone slabs at the center, each with a plush red covering and pillow placed on it. Beyond that, a door of solid bronze now whorled with green patina was the only other note of interest. The ceiling was twice her height above, and the spot of light hovering there hurt to look at directly. She closed her eyes, an orange dot floating in the blackness of her sight.

"Turo?" The weakness of her voice surprised her. "Where are we?"

His head bobbed with the effort of raising it, revealing his tired face. His beard had grown ragged, curling wildly as he smiled. "Prison."

His head fell forward again, and now he too slouched to the side and collapsed on the floor. Kafara wanted to ask more, but had no strength. Lying down seemed like the highest pleasure in life. Nothing would be sweeter. If she had the power, she would crawl to the slabs and flop onto the inviting cushions. It would be so much better than the chill, rough stone. She smoothed her simple blue dress over her legs. Her mouth was dry and tacky, and a lingering taste of something bitter clung to her. It was not an altogether unpleasant taste, holding the faint notes of berry. But she could not remember when she had last eaten a berry of any kind.

The door began to rattle. She could barely see it through her heavy lids. Sleep was all she wanted, the cool, soothing blackness of sleep. Her eyes closed just as the door swung in with a loud, metallic creak.

"Kafara? Turo? You're still awake?" The man's voice echoed in Kafara's head. She felt herself spiraling into a dizzying abyss even as footsteps approached.