The Great Swamp

Zook knew forests.

He knew the difference between a branch broken by a deer and one broken by a man. He knew how long a footprint had been sitting in wet earth by the way water gathered inside it. He knew when birds stopped singing because something dangerous had passed beneath them and when they stopped because rain was coming.

He knew which berries would feed you.

Which would make you sick.

Which would make you wish they had killed you instead.

Swamps were different, but not entirely.

Water changed the rules. Mud lied about weight. Rain erased tracks. Creatures moved beneath the surface instead of across it.

But there were still rules.

That was the important part.

Everything living left a sign.

Everything hunting disturbed something.

Everything fleeing disturbed more.

Zook understood that.

Which was why he did not like the Great Swamp anymore.

He stopped on a half-submerged root and listened.

Behind him, Jandar nearly walked into Deacon.

Deacon stopped before that happened.

Jandar did not.

“Why have we stopped?”

Zook held up one hand.

Jandar lowered his voice.

“Why have we stopped quietly?”

Zook listened.

Water dripped from the trees.

Somewhere far behind them, a frog called.

Insects buzzed around his ears.

Something small splashed to his left.

Normal sounds.

That was the problem.

He turned slowly.

“What?” Deacon asked.

“I don’t know.”

Jandar sighed.

“Excellent. Vegon, tell him that’s your line.”

The high elf brushed an insect from his sleeve.

“I prefer to use it when discussing ancient magic. Zook uses it for mud.”

“Mud is more honest,” Zook said.

Vegon considered that.

“Recently, I’m inclined to agree.”

They continued.

The stone they had seen the evening before had vanished behind the trees again.

Zook knew it was there.

That somehow made it worse.

The Temple of Orozon had appeared through the swamp like a mountain glimpsed through fog—too large to understand from one angle, its upper stones rising above the trees where nothing built by people should have been.

Then the swamp had swallowed it again.

Now they walked toward something they could no longer see.

Zook led.

Deacon followed close behind him. Jandar came next, then Mills, with Xil near enough to catch the minstrel if his legs failed. Vegon brought up the rear, although every few minutes he stopped to examine something that looked old enough to interest him.

In the Great Swamp, that was nearly everything.

Mills was doing better.

Better did not mean well.

His skin had regained some color, and his eyes were his own again. He could walk without being carried. His voice had improved from the raw whisper that had frightened him in the cave, although when he spoke for too long it became rough.

He had tried singing once that morning.

Three notes.

The fourth broke.

He had stopped.

No one commented.

Zook had pretended to be fascinated by a beetle.

Jandar had suddenly become very interested in adjusting his coat.

Even Deacon had found something else to look at.

Mills had noticed all of it.

He smiled.

Then he put the little book away.

That had been hours ago.

Now even Mills had stopped trying to make conversation.

The swamp demanded too much attention.

Every step had to be chosen.

What looked like solid ground might be moss floating over black water. Roots rolled beneath boots. Mud pulled at ankles with enough strength to steal a shoe.

Jandar had already lost one boot twice.

The second time, he had stared down into the mud and said, “I am beginning to believe this place has developed feelings for me.”

“It wants the boot,” Deacon said.

“It can have Vegon’s.”

“No.”

“You have nicer boots.”

“That is precisely why it cannot have them.”

Zook smiled.

That had been an hour ago.

Nobody was joking now.

The rain had finally stopped, but the swamp remained wet enough to remember it.

Heat rose from the ground.

The air smelled of mud, rotting leaves, stagnant water and things that had died somewhere nearby without the courtesy of announcing where.

Insects found every patch of exposed skin.

Something bit Zook on the neck.

He slapped it.

Jandar looked down at him.

“Get it?”

“No.”

“Good. I’d hate to think anything in this swamp was having a difficult day.”

Zook kept moving.

There.

Another track.

He crouched.

Deacon stopped immediately.

The others did the same.

Zook touched the mud beside a pool.

Three narrow toes.

Deep heel.

Large.

He knew that one.

Not the animal itself, perhaps, but the shape told him enough.

Predator.

Heavy.

Moving quickly.

He looked farther along the bank.

The tracks disappeared into water.

Nothing unusual about that.

Except—

Zook shifted three feet to his right.

Another set of tracks crossed the first.

Broad pads.

Claws.

Four-legged.

Also large.

He frowned.

“What is it?” Deacon asked.

“Two animals.”

“That seems manageable.”

“They crossed here.”

Jandar looked around.

“Animals do that.”

“Not these.”

Zook pointed.

“This one hunts near water. This one should avoid it.”

Vegon moved closer.

“Why?”

“Because the first one would eat it.”

Jandar nodded.

“A sound policy.”

Zook followed the second trail.

It went directly toward the deeper water.

Not running.

Walking.

He found another print.

Then another.

No sign of pursuit.

No struggle.

Nothing.

“They were here close together,” he said.

“How close?” Xil asked.

“Maybe minutes.”

Deacon looked into the trees.

“Could be coincidence.”

“Could be.”

Zook did not believe that.

He stood.

Mills was staring north.

Not blankly.

Not like before.

Still, Zook watched him.

Mills noticed.

“I’m all right.”

“I know.”

“You’ve been checking me every time we stop.”

“Yes.”

“That seems excessive.”

“You walked into a swamp while poisoned and tried to feed yourself to something.”

Mills considered.

“That does sound bad when you say it that way.”

“It was worse when you did it.”

Jandar leaned toward Mills.

“He leaves out the part where I saved you.”

Zook looked at him.

“We saved him.”

“I was central.”

“You were wet.”

“Heroically wet.”

Mills reached for his book.

Jandar pointed at him.

“Write that.”

Mills smiled but did not open it.

Zook looked north again.

“Stay close.”

They continued.

The first building appeared less than an hour later.

Zook almost missed it.

A wall rose behind a curtain of vines, gray stone disguised beneath moss and hanging roots. A tree had grown against one corner and then through it, splitting the masonry apart.

Zook stopped.

Jandar peered around Deacon.

“That’s a house.”

“Was,” Deacon said.

Vegon moved past them.

“Wait.”

The high elf approached the wall.

Zook let him.

This was Vegon’s kind of track.

He touched the exposed stone.

“Worked masonry.”

Jandar looked at the rectangular wall.

“We had reached that conclusion.”

Vegon ignored him.

“This was not isolated.”

Zook looked around.

At first, he saw swamp.

Then he changed what he was looking for.

Not buildings.

Lines.

There.

A mound covered in ferns.

Too straight.

Another wall.

A corner.

A depression filled with water that had once been something else.

He moved through the brush.

More stone appeared.

Then more.

Ruins.

Not one house.

Many.

The swamp had grown over them so completely that from twenty feet away they disappeared.

Zook climbed onto the remains of a low wall.

From there he could see farther.

Shapes hid among the trees.

Foundations.

Collapsed roofs.

A narrow tower leaning beneath vines.

And running through all of it—

A road.

Or what had once been one.

“Here.”

The others joined him.

Deacon saw it first.

“Road.”

Zook nodded.

The surface was almost completely buried beneath moss and mud, but trees had not taken root along its center. Roots had broken the edges apart, and water covered sections of it, yet the old route remained.

Jandar stepped onto it.

His boot sank only an inch.

He looked delighted.

“Civilization.”

“It’s a ruined road in a dead settlement,” Xil said.

“It’s dry.”

“Mostly.”

“I have lowered my standards.”

Mills looked around.

“Who lived here?”

Vegon studied the ruins.

“No way to know yet.”

“People who built the temple?” Mills asked.

“Possibly.”

“People who served Orozon?”

“Possibly.”

“People Orozon killed?”

Vegon looked at him.

“Also possibly.”

Mills nodded.

“You are very informative.”

“I dislike inventing answers.”

Jandar coughed.

Everyone looked at him.

He shrugged.

“What?”

Zook stepped off the wall.

The road was easier.

He did not trust it.

That bothered him.

Roads were simple things.

They told you where people had wanted to go.

Even ruined roads remembered.

This one went northeast.

Toward the temple.

Zook crouched near its edge.

Small tracks crossed the mud.

Rodents.

Lizards.

Something snake-like.

Normal.

Then he found another.

He stared at it.

“What now?” Jandar asked.

Zook did not answer.

He moved farther down the road.

Another print.

Different animal.

Then another.

He began searching both sides.

Deacon watched him.

“You’re seeing something.”

“Too much.”

“That’s usually good for a tracker.”

“Not when it doesn’t belong together.”

Zook pointed toward the left side of the road.

“Something nested there.”

A hollow beneath a root.

Freshly used.

He crossed to the opposite side.

“These tracks came out of the water last night.”

Jandar looked between them.

“And?”

“They should not be this close.”

“Why?”

“They compete.”

“For food?”

“Food. Territory. Everything.”

Zook stood.

“And neither one is avoiding the other.”

Xil’s expression tightened.

“The temple.”

“Maybe.”

Vegon looked toward the unseen structure.

“Magical influence?”

Zook shook his head.

“I don’t know magic.”

“No,” Vegon said. “But you know this.”

Zook appreciated that.

He looked into the woods.

A swamp was not chaos.

People thought wild places were chaotic because they did not understand the rules.

But a swamp had more rules than a city.

Everything fought for space.

For food.

For light.

For water that was not too foul even for things that lived in foul water.

Predators marked territory.

Prey learned those marks.

Birds nested where snakes struggled to climb.

Small animals moved when larger ones slept.

Plants grew according to light and water.

Death fed everything.

Nothing was wasted.

Nothing was random.

Here, the rules were loosening.

Not gone.

Not yet.

Just—

Wrong.

Zook moved forward more slowly.

The others followed.

The road curved between ruined buildings.

Some were little more than foundations.

Others still had portions of walls standing.

One had the remains of a doorway with no building behind it.

Vines hung across the opening.

Jandar stopped beside it.

“Do we knock?”

“No,” Deacon said.

“Good. I didn’t want to.”

They passed the tower.

Up close, it was smaller than Zook had thought. The upper section had collapsed long ago, spilling stone into the swamp. Roots wrapped around the base.

That made sense.

Zook liked it.

The swamp was winning.

It was supposed to.

Then they rounded the next bend.

And saw the temple.

This time there was no mistaking it.

Everyone stopped.

The Temple of Orozon rose beyond the ruins.

Not above them.

Through them.

Its broad stone mass climbed out of the swamp in enormous steps, each level narrower than the one beneath it. The shape reminded Zook of a hill made by someone who hated curves.

Trees crowded near it.

But not on it.

Vines reached the lower stone and seemed to thin.

Moss covered portions of the outer walls, but far less than it should have.

The settlement around them had been broken open by roots.

The temple had not.

Four hundred years.

Zook tried to imagine four hundred winters.

Four hundred springs.

Four hundred seasons of rain filling every crack.

Trees grew from seeds to giants and fell again in less time than that.

Stone did not defeat a swamp for four hundred years.

Not without help.

Mills whispered, “That is considerably less friendly from here.”

Jandar glanced at him.

“You thought it looked friendly before?”

“I thought it looked dramatic.”

“Different thing.”

“I’m learning.”

Vegon had gone completely still.

That worried Zook almost as much as the temple.

“What?”

Vegon did not answer.

“Vegon.”

“I’m looking.”

“You can look while talking.”

“No, I cannot.”

Jandar nodded solemnly.

“He’s very gifted, but only one gift at a time.”

Vegon ignored him.

Zook studied the temple instead.

Something moved in the trees to their right.

He turned.

Gone.

He listened.

A rustle.

Small.

Probably.

He hoped.

“Road continues,” Deacon said.

It did.

Straight toward the temple.

Zook hated that too.

He moved ahead.

“Stay on it.”

Jandar looked into the trees.

“I was planning to wander aimlessly into the dark swamp, but your idea has merit.”

“I mean it.”

Something in Zook’s voice silenced him.

Deacon looked at the woods.

“What are you seeing?”

“That’s the problem.”

Zook pointed toward a patch of mud.

“No tracks.”

They all looked.

Jandar frowned.

“I thought too many tracks were bad.”

“They were.”

“And now none are bad.”

“Yes.”

“I dislike tracking.”

Zook walked farther.

The road remained overgrown.

Plants grew between the stones.

Insects still moved.

But the larger signs had disappeared.

No prints.

No scat.

No broken brush.

No fur caught on bark.

No claw marks.

Nothing had crossed the road.

He stepped to the edge.

The woods began six feet away.

Dense.

Dark.

Alive.

He could hear things moving in them.

But nothing came near the road.

“Something keeps them back,” he said.

Xil touched the symbol at his chest.

“Can you tell what?”

“No.”

Vegon looked toward the temple.

“We can guess.”

Zook shook his head.

“No.”

Vegon looked at him.

“Guessing gets you killed.”

Jandar raised a finger.

“I would like the record to show that I have survived quite a lot of guessing.”

Deacon said, “Barely.”

“Survival does not become less impressive because it is narrow.”

Mills’s hand moved toward his book again.

Jandar saw it.

“Not that.”

Mills lowered his hand.

Zook continued.

The closer they came to the temple, the quieter the swamp became.

Not silent.

That would have been easier.

Silence meant danger.

This was different.

The sounds moved away from them.

Frogs called behind.

Birds cried somewhere to the west.

Something splashed far off among the trees.

But ahead—

Nothing.

Zook looked back.

The others had noticed.

Even Jandar.

The pirate’s hand rested near his rapier.

Deacon had his crossbow ready.

Xil watched Mills again.

Vegon watched the temple.

Mills watched all of them.

“You know,” the minstrel said quietly, “when everyone becomes serious at the same time, I find that concerning.”

“You should,” Deacon said.

They reached the first broad stones at the temple’s base near midday.

Zook touched one.

Cool.

The day was hot enough that the road stones felt warm beneath his boots.

This one did not.

He pulled his hand away.

Vegon noticed.

“What?”

“Cold.”

Vegon touched it.

His expression changed.

“Interesting.”

“That word means something different when you say it.”

“Usually.”

Xil placed his palm against the stone.

“Magic?”

Vegon shook his head.

“Not anything obvious.”

Zook looked upward.

From here, the temple blocked half the sky.

It was not beautiful.

It was too severe for that.

Every line had purpose.

Every block seemed placed to survive.

There were carvings, but many had been worn down enough that Zook could not make sense of them.

Or perhaps he simply did not know what he was looking at.

Vegon would.

Later.

Zook cared about the entrance.

He found the approach by following the road.

The temple had not hidden it.

That surprised him.

A broad rise led toward a dark opening in the stone.

No glowing runes.

No magical barrier.

No impossible door.

Just an entrance.

That was worse.

Jandar stopped beside him.

“I was expecting something more.”

“More what?”

“Threatening.”

Zook looked at the enormous ancient temple rising out of a swamp where animals had forgotten how to behave.

“This isn’t threatening?”

“I meant skulls.”

“Why?”

“Evil places like skulls.”

Deacon walked past them.

“You like skulls.”

“That is different.”

“How?”

“I’m charming.”

Mills laughed.

The sound turned into a cough.

Xil was beside him immediately.

Mills waved him away.

“I’m fine.”

“You are recovering.”

“I am recovering very successfully.”

“You coughed.”

“I have done that before.”

“Not while poisoned by four different substances.”

Mills thought about it.

“Probably not.”

Zook watched him carefully.

No black eyes.

No distant stare.

No turning north.

Nothing.

Still, as they approached the entrance, Mills slowed.

Zook noticed.

“You feel something?”

Everyone stopped.

Mills looked toward the opening.

“No.”

“Sure?”

“No singing. No pulling. No strange thoughts.”

Jandar smiled.

“Any normal strange thoughts?”

“Several.”

“Good.”

Mills rubbed at his throat.

“It just feels…”

He stopped.

“What?” Xil asked.

Mills looked embarrassed.

“Like somewhere I shouldn’t sing.”

Nobody laughed.

Zook turned toward the entrance.

He understood.

Not the singing.

The feeling.

The swamp had been difficult since the moment they entered it.

Wet.

Hot.

Dangerous.

Full of things that bit, poisoned, hunted and hid.

But those things belonged there.

Even the grung belonged.

Even the creature in the black water belonged, as far as Zook knew.

This did not.

The temple had not become part of the swamp.

It had forced the swamp to become part of it.

Zook suddenly understood what had bothered him since morning.

He had been reading the land as though the temple were something inside it.

A ruin.

A destination.

A place.

It was not.

Not to the creatures here.

To them, the temple was a boundary.

Everything Zook had seen—the overlapping territories, the strange tracks, the empty road, the retreating sounds—was not nature becoming confused.

Nature knew exactly what it was doing.

It was staying away.

Zook looked back along the ruined road.

The abandoned settlement disappeared beneath vines and trees.

Beyond it, the swamp waited.

Four centuries had taken the homes.

The tower.

The road.

Almost everything people had built here.

But not this.

He turned back.

Deacon stood at the entrance.

Jandar beside him.

Vegon stared into the darkness with the expression he usually wore just before touching something Zook wished he would leave alone.

Xil remained close to Mills.

Five companions.

And now a minstrel who had followed them because somewhere between a cage and a cave he had decided their story was worth risking his life to see.

Zook wondered what Mills would write about this part.

Probably something about brave heroes standing before an ancient evil.

That was not what it felt like.

Zook was tired.

His clothes smelled like swamp.

Something had bitten him in at least nine places.

Jandar had mud on his face and did not know it.

Deacon looked as though he wanted to shoot the temple.

Vegon wanted to study it.

Xil distrusted it.

Mills looked frightened.

Zook thought that was much closer to the truth.

Jandar glanced down at him.

“Well?”

Zook looked into the entrance.

Darkness.

Stone.

Cool air touched his face.

Behind him, the swamp buzzed and croaked and lived.

Ahead, nothing made a sound.

Zook drew his bow.

“Stay together.”

Jandar drew his rapier.

“That has worked wonderfully so far.”

Deacon stepped across the threshold.

Xil followed.

Then Mills.

Vegon paused long enough to look up once more at the impossible stone before entering.

Jandar gestured grandly toward the darkness.

“After you.”

Zook looked at him.

“You’re taller.”

“That has never before been presented as a reason for me to enter an evil temple first.”

“It is now.”

Jandar sighed.

“Fine.”

He stepped inside.

Zook followed.

The swamp disappeared behind him.

For the first time since entering the Great Swamp, there were no insects.

No rain.

No mud sucking at his boots.

No hidden animals moving beneath black water.

Only stone.

Zook had spent his life learning how to read the wild.

He knew when something hunted him.

He knew when something feared him.

He knew when something wanted him gone.

As he crossed into the Temple of Orozon, he realized there was one thing he had never learned.

How to read a place that had been waiting.