Beneath the Stone Guardians

The first bolt struck the statue beside Vegon with the sound of a splitting tree. Stone burst outward. He twisted in the air, one hand raised against fragments that hissed past his face, and glimpsed a dark shape above the cliff before the second bolt came.

“Down!” Deacon shouted.

Jandar was already moving. A bolt as thick as his forearm punched into the ground where he had stood. It did not bury itself so much as plow a narrow trench through gravel. He slid behind the nearer statue, caught himself against its ankle and looked up.

Two ogres stood on the ridge. Neither carried a club. Great wooden engines were strapped against their chests, their bow arms reinforced with iron. One hauled back a heavy string while the other peered down through the rain-dark light, deciding whom to kill next.

“Well,” Jandar said. “They have come prepared.”

Deacon answered with a crossbow bolt. The shot climbed toward the ridge and struck the nearer ogre high in the shoulder. It bellowed and recoiled from the edge.

Zook was already scrambling for a better angle, using the stone foot of the other guardian to shield himself. He drew and fired with the economy Jandar had come to appreciate: no wasted motion, no pause to admire his work. His arrows followed Deacon’s bolt into the first ogre’s exposed side.

“Two of them,” Zook called.

“I counted,” Deacon replied.

“I wanted you to know I counted too.”

A third missile tore through the air. Vegon drifted hard toward the rock face, out of the line of fire, and sent power upward. Lightning caught the second ogre across its chest. For a moment its monstrous outline burned white against the storm. The creature staggered but stayed on its feet. The smell of scorched cloth reached Jandar below.

Xil moved beneath the statue’s outstretched arm, keeping his back against stone while he reached toward the ridge. His prayer carried strangely in the narrow passage, as though another voice were speaking beneath his own. The corrupted power answered anyway. Pale force struck the injured ogre and drove it farther from the brink.

One of the great engines fired again. The bolt slammed into rock so near Zook that fragments peppered his cloak. Jandar had seen shipboard weapons of similar force, but never in the hands of a creature that could drag one around like a hunting bow.

He measured the cliff. There was a route upward, if one was willing to call a string of narrow cracks and crooked shelves a route. He was willing. He had barely shifted his weight when Deacon called from below.

“Stay there. We have them.”

Jandar looked back. “I was going to offer my compliments in person.”

“Offer them from the ground.”

Another thunderclap rolled across the gorge. Under it came the dull, urgent beat of bowstrings and the harsher note of Vegon’s magic. Jandar kept to the shelter of the statue, moving when the ogres changed targets, trying to draw a shot away from the others when there was room. He could do little with his rapier at that distance, and charging a sheer cliff while two siege bolts watched its face was an extravagant way to die.

Zook’s next arrows struck the wounded ogre in quick succession. It lurched, clutched the edge of the ridge and fell backward out of sight. The remaining creature turned on the gnome. Deacon shot it before it could fire. Vegon’s lightning followed, crawling over the wood and iron braced against its massive torso. The ogre convulsed, then vanished from the ledge.

For several breaths no one moved.

The wind returned first. Then the soft patter of pebbles falling from the statues’ weathered faces.

“Finished?” Mills asked from the safer end of the passage.

Deacon kept his crossbow raised. “For now.”

Jandar looked at the cliff. “I should verify their hospitality.”

He climbed while the others watched, finding holds where the rock seemed determined to offer none. At the ridge he found the ogres collapsed among their cumbersome weapons. There was little on them beyond dirty cloth, crude gear and a purse of silver. He looked into it, weighed the coins and climbed back down.

He set the silver on a flat rock where everyone could see it.

Mills glanced at the pile. “You know you could have kept that.”

“An appalling accusation.” Jandar brushed grit from his sleeves. “Captains have crews. Crews share.”

“Were we aware you had become our captain?” Deacon asked.

“No. I find elections hurt morale.”

The banter eased the sharp edge of the fight, but the statues remained. Both rose from the mountainside with the solemn indifference of the dead. Vegon descended to inspect the weathered faces again. He found no inscription that explained why the guardians stood here. Zook found no recent trail leading between them. Xil studied the stone as though waiting for it to acknowledge him.

Jandar tried the space between the statues once more.

The cliff looked solid. It felt solid at first. He followed a seam with his fingers, then leaned closer to test a patch that seemed slightly cooler than the rest. His hand passed into darkness.

He caught his breath and stumbled forward. For an instant there was stone on either side of his vision and no stone beneath his palm. Then he was through, standing inside a narrow passage with the open air hidden behind a wall that was not a wall at all.

“Jandar?” Deacon’s voice came muffled through the illusion.

He reached back. His hand appeared to sink into the cliff.

“Found the door.”

“You found a door?” Vegon asked.

“Not precisely. It has very poor manners.”

One by one they came through. Mills hesitated longest, then entered with his lute held protectively against his chest. The passage beyond sloped into the mountain. Cold air stirred against their faces, carrying the dry smell of old masonry and the faint tang of oil.

Jandar drew his rapier. He had spent enough time on ships to dislike corridors whose builders went to such trouble to conceal the entrance.

The first turn brought them to a junction. One branch had collapsed under an ancient fall of rock. The other continued into darkness. From that direction came a repeating metallic sound: a scrape, a brief pause, then a hard hiss.

“Someone sharpening a sword?” Mills whispered.

“Several swords,” Deacon said.

“Or one very committed owner.”

They went right.

The sound grew louder until Jandar could feel it through the soles of his boots. Ahead, pale blue light marked the far end of a straight passage. Before it lay an obstacle none of them mistook for an ordinary door.

Blades thrust from slots in alternating walls, each one sweeping across the corridor before withdrawing. Some moved higher than others. Some cut through the space a crouched man would occupy, while others threatened anyone foolish enough to jump without looking. Scars in the stone testified to centuries of relentless motion. Near the closest slot lay a skeleton, its bones scattered among dark stains.

Jandar watched the rhythm through several cycles.

“That,” he said, “is unnecessarily elaborate.”

Vegon leaned past him. “The mechanism is still functioning.”

“Thank you. I had overlooked the moving blades.”

Jandar tried sliding a loose piece of equipment along the floor. It passed beneath the first blade and rattled against the skeleton. No immediate trick answered. He crouched to study the slots, searching for a lever or break in the masonry. There was nothing he could reach from this end.

“Can you disable it?” Deacon asked.

“Not by asking politely.”

He stepped back, judged the first gap and went low. His boots lost purchase for a heartbeat, but he slid between the blades and came up on one knee before the steel returned. The next section required a leap and a twist of the shoulders. For the third he planted a foot against the wall, pushed himself sideways and landed in the narrow island of safety between two sweeping edges.

The sound filled his head. Steel cut the air close enough to tug his coat. He waited, breathed once and crossed the final span.

He stood at the far end, whole and grinning, before realizing no one else looked amused.

“Perfectly manageable,” he called.

“I hate when he says that,” Zook replied.

Jandar examined the stone around the exit. He could find no device to stop the blades, only the same smooth masonry and moving slots. Beyond them, a chamber glowed with an unnatural blue light.

Three stone sarcophagi stood in a row. The light came from two flames that burned without wood or visible fuel. Their hue threw cold shadows beneath the coffins’ lids and left the corners of the room uneasy and dim. The chamber was otherwise bare, its silence broken only by the mechanical shriek of the corridor behind him.

Jandar moved toward the center coffin. The lid was worn but intact. He searched its rim and the floor around it, then set both hands against the stone and shoved.

It resisted. He dug in his heels and tried again.

All three lids burst apart.

Rotten linen and dust rose with the sound of breaking stone. Three figures unfolded from the coffins, their skin shriveled against ancient bone, their wrapped arms reaching for the living. One struck Jandar before he could retreat. Cold pain spread through his chest beneath the blow, unnatural and hungry, as though the creature had tried to seize more than flesh.

He staggered back and narrowly slipped beyond its grasp.

“Company!” he shouted.

“What kind?” Deacon called.

“The unfriendly dead!”

The nearest creature advanced. Jandar retreated toward the last gap in the blades, keeping his rapier between them. Beyond the trap came the snap of Deacon’s crossbow. A bolt drove into one mummy’s chest, followed by another that tore through the brittle wrappings. The creature scarcely reacted until the third impact knocked it against the stone behind it.

Vegon appeared at the edge of the corridor and sent narrow darts of force into the room. Xil’s summoned weapon glimmered ahead of him, a shape of divine will that hammered at the nearest corpse. The blue flames shook in the wake of the spells, though no wind stirred them.

Jandar vaulted back across one of the moving blades to clear a line of fire, then turned and crossed again when a gap opened. Through the mechanical shriek he saw Zook coming, quick and low, running where the steel was highest and dropping flat where it swept down. The gnome made it through the killing passage with a final scramble and came up beside him, bow forgotten in favor of close steel.

For a heartbeat Jandar thought they had them contained.

Then one of the mummies struck Zook.

The creature’s hand closed against his shoulder. Zook recoiled, and even from a few paces away Jandar saw his face change. Not merely pain. Something colder, as though the blow had left poison moving beneath his skin. He fought on, driving his blade into the dead thing, but the color was draining from him.

“Xil!” Jandar shouted.

“I see him.”

The cleric cast another prayer into the room. An eerie radiance settled over one of the advancing corpses, making its movements easier to follow in the blue half-light. Deacon fired into it twice. The second bolt finally drove the creature down.

Jandar braced a foot against the wall beside the moving blades and threw himself across the gap. He landed near the surviving mummy, turned the motion into a sweeping cut and struck with the moon-touched rapier. Pale light flashed against the thing’s corrupted wrappings. The mummy reeled but did not fall.

Zook slashed at it from the other side. His sword found flesh beneath the linen, and he raised his shield as it twisted toward him. Jandar saw the opening. He stepped in close and drove the rapier deep. The thing shuddered and collapsed in a tangle of old cloth.

Silence returned to the chamber, except for the endless sweep of the trap outside.

Jandar stood over the last body, his breathing hard. The place stank of dust, dead flesh and a bitter sweetness he could not name. Zook leaned against a sarcophagus, his face gray beneath the freckles.

“Are you hurt?” Jandar asked.

“Some.”

Xil came through to examine him. After one look, the cleric’s expression sharpened.

“Do not move until I have dealt with that.”

“What is it?” Deacon called.

“A curse. It is interfering with his body’s ability to mend.”

Jandar looked from the dead thing on the floor to Zook. “An ordinary knife wound would have been too simple.”

They searched the three coffins. Beyond rotting linen and the remnants of the creatures, there was nothing worth carrying. There was no other door, no secret stair, no lever to halt the corridor’s blades. Whatever the room had once been meant to protect was either long gone or hidden elsewhere.

“We came down here for nothing,” Deacon said.

“Not nothing,” Jandar replied. “We established the local burial customs are aggressive.”

They had to return the way they had come.

Jandar crossed first, weaving between the moving edges. He reached the far side, turned and watched Zook attempt the passage. The gnome could still move, but too much strength had been taken from him. He ducked under one blade, stumbled away from the next and misjudged the last sweep.

Steel caught him.

The sound was worse than Jandar expected. Zook fell among the moving blades and lay still.

“No!”

Jandar was already back at the edge. He could see where the little ranger had fallen, impossibly close and separated by three relentless sweeps of steel. There was no time to calculate a safer route. Each pass threatened to cut Zook again.

“Rod,” he said, extending a hand toward Vegon. “Give me the rod.”

Vegon handed over the immovable rod without arguing. Jandar worked the first opening, driving the enchanted length against the sweep of steel and locking it in place. The blade hit with a shriek and shattered. Fragments stung his face and arms. The mechanism continued to thrust its broken support from the wall, but the cutting edge was gone.

He moved to the next slot. His timing was less fortunate. Steel caught him as he set the rod, opening a sharp line across his side. He forced the device into place anyway. Another blade broke against it, sending fragments ringing along the corridor.

“Jandar!” Deacon called.

“Working!”

He reached the last span bruised and bleeding, with his heart hammering against his ribs. The metal snapped again under the impossible resistance of the rod. He stumbled forward into the gap it left, fell to his knees beside Zook and found a pulse so weak he could barely feel it.

“Stay with us,” he whispered.

He lifted the gnome carefully. Zook’s weight was slight, but the passage seemed to lengthen around them as Jandar carried him back through the damaged trap. Deacon met him at the safe end. Together they laid Zook against the wall where Xil could reach him.

The cleric knelt, prayer beads already sliding through his fingers.

The first working sought the curse, not the wound. Jandar felt the air grow heavy as Xil called on power that had been strained too often in the past days. The familiar taint moved through the light, dark threads twisting at its edges, but Xil held to the prayer until something in Zook’s body released its grip.

Zook gasped.

Xil did not stop. Healing followed in successive waves, enough to close the worst cuts and bring color back to the gnome’s face. His fingers tightened against the stone. At last his eyes opened.

Jandar let out the breath he had been holding.

Zook blinked at the faces above him. “Did I make it?”

“Eventually,” Deacon said.

Jandar sat back on his heels. “Your route required an adjustment.”

Zook looked toward the corridor. The ruined blades continued to shove their broken arms into empty air.

“Oh.” He shut his eyes again. “I think I liked the old route better.”

“You were not particularly good at it,” Jandar said.

Deacon looked at Jandar’s bloodied side. “Neither were you.”

“I brought him back.”

“You did.” Deacon lowered his voice. “Thank you.”

Jandar held his gaze for a moment. Then he stood, testing his injured side and deciding he would complain about it later.

Mills had remained quiet through the healing. Now he crouched beside Zook, his lute still slung awkwardly across his back.

“Do you want me to write this down?” he asked.

Zook regarded him for a long moment. “Not yet.”

“A wise editorial choice,” Jandar said.

Xil watched the gnome until he was certain Zook could stand. Only then did he rise. His hand lingered at the beads beneath his armor, feeling what power remained to him. Jandar noticed, and did not ask.

Ahead, the passage bent around another corner, leading deeper beneath the mountains. They had found a chamber of dead men and nearly left one of their own in it. No sign told them whether the concealed road ahead offered an answer to Chul’ Tor’s riddle or merely another room built to kill whoever entered.

Deacon checked the string of his crossbow. Vegon drew a small, steady light into his palm. Zook took a slow breath, adjusted the straps of his gear and nodded that he could walk.

Jandar looked back at the shattered blades, then into the dark passage ahead.

“Next time,” he said, “we look for a less theatrical entrance.”

The others followed him deeper into the stone.