The Cave Part 32

Our steps were threatened with slippery patches as we moved further into the deep unknown, following the tunnel down into the darkness below. There were indeed steps cut into the stone for footholds, but it was as if the creature we pursued liberally vomited its shadow glaze here for particular effect as a deliberate obstacle to our passing. Intentional or not, we were forced to move slowly and carefully. I for one was especially glad I had a staff to lean upon, though my every step continued to shift the blue light back and forth a little more aggressively with each movement downwards.

Tharkin was not speaking, but I could hear more from him behind me than silent following steps. There was something in his rigid bearing and absolute quiet that kept my own guard up, as if the closer we got to our quarry, the more intense that silence would be. Glip for his part was a little less quiet, constantly turning about with arrow notched to bow ready to fire, and the powerful orc Bjardon, a lumbering but solid presence if not exactly quiet.

There is something powerfully scary about walking in darkness that you know will only get deeper the further you get. At least in my experience I had never found more light going down underground, and the creature that had made its lair down here was not about to leave any candles in the window so to speak. Only the light from my staff showed the walls expanding away from us again, and the entrance to a vast underground being spread before our feet. That is when I saw it. The first glitters of purplish light coming from far beyond, and not just where we pressed down on the shadow glaze matrix.

"The fortress," hissed Glip in the quiet that followed our unspoken halt. "It is filled with lights."

I saw what he meant when I allowed the Staff of Aquinian to reduce its blue flame light. As the darkness gathered back in, our eyes adjusted to the change and we could see that the glitters I had first noticed, were actually purple flames from braziers that stood in vaulted windows of the fortress tower beyond. It was indeed a tall structure, and seemed ridiculous to have been built underground unless in the past there were great armies that would have attempted to storm it. The walls that the goblins had mentioned, were also quite high and encircled a great space. From where we were at the tunnel exit, it indeed looked like a great barrier to any traffic if there were guardians inside.

"What was this for mate?" queried Bjardon, looking a little to the left and right of the stronghold settlement. "What is here to protect?"

"This was not always here," replied Tharkin with a low thoughtful voice. "This was buried in times past, in some long forgotten titanic upheaval of the earth."

"How do you know?" I asked, intrigued and rather fond of staying where we were, far away from the fortress lights.

"The architecture, the sheer glassy walls, and the alien stone matrix around the foot of these self same walls," replied the hermit, gesturing. There is no match to the stones this structure is found in, and the rippled ground that rises away from it. You can see the impact lines of the fall. Further, this place did not come from our realm. There is power emanating from the stones. This has come from the Shadow Realm itself."

I felt rather foolish after that explanation, seeing the same evidence with a new perspective. From the Shadow Realm. These words reverberated in my mind as I looked again with a new appreciation for what my mentor had pointed out. Did not Tytiana say she was supposed to have ruled this realm, been born for the purpose? How many thousands of years had passed since her death, and the corruption of the shadow lands been completed? Even as I asked this of myself, I wondered if the corruption would have taken place in either case. Perhaps she would have become someone entirely different from the lady I had met in dreams. However, all this conjecture was pointless. History was set, and could not be changed for the wanting. We had a job to do now in our present, and it was supposedly me that had to do it.

"Let's go," I said, leading the way down to the fortress and its silent walls.

"Oh this not feel good," sighed Glip, looking far from pleased, though he followed me.

Almost immediately I noticed the dark stains on the ground before us. Burnt places along the ground that could only be explained by one thing that I knew of. The creature had passed this way before us, straight for the fortress and most likely into the tower's dungeons. That sharp stench was back again. The blood gave it off, and led us like a grim trail. Part of my mind wondered why we had not seen or smelled it before, but then I realized the creature must have descended down here an alternative way. Doubtless it had used its time imprisoned in the mine tunnels to learn every secret there was. This was not good news for us, but one of the many factors that had to be considered.

"The old ones did not fear attack, but still built walls?" asked our orc companion, pointing out the oddest thing we had seen so far. There were no doors in the wall, just a large open gateway.

"Perhaps this was guarded by something else in the past," suggested Tharkin, extending his hands to reach out with golden streamers of light from his fingers. These threads sped towards the gap in the wall, but reached nothing now except air. I realized I had never asked the hermit about his unique powers nor his skill set, and this was something I had to rectify before we parted again, providing we survived. Somehow I knew these golden tendrils he used for many things would come in handy if he could impart the secrets of them to me.

"Nothing," sighed my old mentor, with a slightly disappointed note to his voice. "That is either very good for us, or a bad sign."

"Don't try to encourage us much will you?" I replied with a chuckle, though my one attempt at sarcastic humor seemed to fall dead in this place of darkness.

With cautious steps, we entered the gap in the walls where a door should have stood, and entered the fortress ring. Buildings which had remained hidden from the outside now stood in rows like mausoleums in a graveyard. There was such grim uniformity about them, tall buildings along the walls, smaller ones in front, and all lined up as if they stood guard over the central strip of road that led straight to the tower. It was terrifying. Just dark open doorways into each of these silent sentinel structures, like yawning mouths breathing in deeply, or preparing to devour.

At the center of the deathly quiet settlement was the tower, yet it stood before a round central plaza. Somewhere in the long past, this must have been a meeting place for the former residents of the silent buildings, but now there was nothing but dark glassy stone, and a slim trail of a few burnt droplets of blood along the route leading to the open massive doors of the tower. The purple lights above in the ancient windows, cast our shadows over the ground behind us. In that quiet place, a sudden group of sighs nearly made me jump out of my skin.

Turning around, I saw with horror that many of the small buildings lining the road had begun to illuminate from their doorways, and within these glowing portals forms began to take shape. Dark shadows in vaguely human form, but long arms ending in claw like fingers that nearly reached their feet. Then eyes began to shine from the shadowy figures, bright purple points of fire in their faces, a triangular form of three. Another group of sighs came forth from these figures, and they moved on long legs with clawed feet.

"Stay together!" cried Tharkin, reaching within to draw on his inner powers of flame.