The building had no business standing.
That was what Fendor noticed first.
The heroes had crossed three ruined streets since leaving the salt mound behind. Every structure around them had been broken by age, war, or whatever force had shattered the ancient city. Roofs had collapsed inward. Towers leaned against neighboring buildings. Trees grew through floors that had once been stone.
Then they found the house.
Its walls stood straight.
Its roof remained intact.
Even the narrow windows appeared unbroken.
Centuries had destroyed everything around it and somehow missed one building.
Hexen stopped beside a fallen column.
“I distrust it.”
Nethnarel looked at the house.
“You distrust doors.”
“I have expanded the category.”
Kaylor approached first.
The others let him.
After the Labyrinth of Wicked Souls, volunteering to touch something suspicious had become a recognizable form of courage.
He reached toward the door.
His hand stopped several inches from the wood.
Something invisible pushed back.
Kaylor frowned and pressed harder.
Pale light spread beneath his fingers.
Not from him.
From the building.
Lines of magic flashed briefly across the door, then raced outward across the walls until the entire structure glimmered inside a translucent shell.
Leonidas whistled.
“Protected.”
Grazim looked back toward the streets they had crossed.
The great salt mound remained visible between the ruins. Beyond it, green vapor still crawled from the crevasse they had postponed investigating.
They were exhausted.
Hexen had one wolf remaining from the battle with the salt creatures, and even that animal had begun to fade at the edges as the magic calling it into the world weakened.
Kaylor leaned on his sword.
Nethnarel’s flames had dimmed.
Even Fendor had stopped pretending fatigue was something that happened only to other people.
Grazim shook his head.
“Not now.”
Nethnarel stared at him.
“That may be the wisest thing anyone has said since we woke up.”
They left the house unopened.
For once, curiosity lost to exhaustion.
The heroes returned toward the butte.
The journey was not far, but the ruined city made every street longer than it should have been. Rubble forced them around collapsed buildings. Empty windows followed them. Somewhere beneath the broken streets, stone shifted from time to time.
No one investigated.
The butte had already become one of the few places in the dead city that felt almost familiar.
Almost.
It was where they had found the surviving patrol.
Where the worms had attacked.
Where Kaylor had recognized the old heraldry worn by one of the dragonborn survivors.
A few of those guards still remained among the ruins when the heroes returned. They looked nearly as exhausted as the people coming toward them.
No one had strength enough for much conversation.
They ate.
They drank.
Grazim tended what wounds remained.
Then the Heroes of the New Beginning slept beneath a broken roof in a city that had been dead for longer than any of them could remember.
Nothing attacked them.
That alone felt miraculous.
When they returned to the strange house, their strength had come back.
So had their suspicion.
Kaylor stood before the invisible barrier.
This time he did not push against it.
He closed his eyes.
The magic surrounding the building was complicated but old. Layer upon layer of protection had been woven together until the structure existed almost apart from the city surrounding it.
Kaylor raised one hand.
The words came from somewhere inside him.
They were not a prayer.
Not exactly.
The magic obeyed anyway.
“Dispel.”
Pale light crossed the building.
For several seconds, nothing changed.
Then one of the glowing lines surrounding the door broke.
Another followed.
The web of protection flickered.
The pressure against Kaylor’s hand disappeared.
Leonidas stepped forward.
“Better.”
He removed a set of silver chimes.
Fendor looked at them.
“You had those?”
“Yes.”
“For how long?”
Leonidas considered the question.
“A while.”
Nethnarel nodded.
“Excellent accounting.”
Leonidas struck the Chimes of Opening.
The note seemed far too small to affect anything.
Then something deep within the house answered.
Locks turned.
Bolts withdrew.
Mechanisms that had remained untouched for centuries began moving behind the walls.
The door opened.
Ancient air billowed into the street.
It smelled stale enough to possess weight.
Dust.
Old stone.
Something chemical.
Something rotten.
And beneath all of it, the unmistakable odor of a place that had been sealed away from the world for an impossibly long time.
Pete flew through first.
Invisible, naturally.
Nethnarel watched the empty doorway.
“Our bravest member.”
Leonidas ignored her.
“He says nothing is moving.”
“Yet.”
They entered.
The interior should have been destroyed.
Instead, it was merely filthy.
A black-brown sludge coated the floor. The same substance covered tables, chairs, shelves, glass vessels and books whose spines could barely be seen beneath layers of grime.
Hexen scraped one finger across a worktable.
The coating peeled away.
Beneath it, the wood was perfect.
Not preserved well.
Perfect.
He rubbed harder.
The grain looked freshly polished.
Fendor cleaned part of a metal instrument.
No rust.
Nethnarel uncovered the edge of a glass container.
No cracks.
Grazim stared around the room.
“The dirt is old.”
“The things beneath it are not,” Kaylor said.
“Or they are,” Isamu replied, “and something prevented them from aging.”
That thought made the room less comfortable.
Nethnarel moved slowly between the shelves.
“This belonged to someone who used magic.”
Leonidas glanced at the preserved instruments.
“You narrowed that down quickly.”
Nethnarel gestured at a metal cage hanging upside down from the ceiling for no apparent reason.
“I have instincts.”
Several doors led deeper into the building.
The first opened into an empty storage room.
The second refused to move.
Kaylor examined it.
“No ward.”
“Trap?” Hexen asked.
Fendor looked at the door.
“Probably.”
Kaylor opened it.
Flame erupted through the doorway.
Everyone threw themselves backward.
Fire filled the room beyond and rolled across the ceiling of the outer chamber. Kaylor crossed both arms before his face as the heat struck him.
Then, as quickly as it had appeared, the fire vanished.
Nethnarel stared at the scorched doorway.
Fendor looked at Kaylor.
“Probably.”
Kaylor straightened.
“Yes.”
Beyond the door lay a smaller chamber.
Most of it was covered by moss.
At least, that was what it appeared to be.
Thick green growth spread over the walls and floor. Pale tendrils hung from shelves. Small patches glowed faintly beneath the surface.
Leonidas crouched beside the nearest patch.
“That may be useful.”
Hexen looked at him.
“You do not know what it is.”
“That is why I want some.”
Nethnarel folded her arms.
“I admire the consistency of your reasoning.”
Leonidas reached down and scraped at the glowing moss.
The floor attacked him.
The green mass rose in a single violent motion.
Tendrils wrapped around Leonidas’s arm.
He swore and pulled away.
What had appeared to be moss gathered itself into a thick plantlike body. Branches or limbs unfolded from the walls. A dark opening appeared within the greenery.
Leonidas pointed his free hand.
Eldritch Blast struck the creature.
Force tore through the green mass.
The thing recoiled and released him.
A second blast struck.
The creature shrank backward into the chamber.
Nethnarel stepped past Leonidas.
She spoke a word none of the others understood.
Dark energy spread from her hand.
Whatever spell she used seemed to draw the life directly from the growth.
The creature sagged.
Leaves curled.
Green turned gray.
The entire mass contracted until the huge thing became little more than a trembling knot of plant matter against the wall.
Leonidas stared at it.
Then at Nethnarel.
“That seems useful.”
“I have instincts.”
He waited until the creature stopped moving.
Then he scraped some of the residue into a vial.
The material glowed.
Nethnarel stared at him.
“You have learned nothing.”
“I learned not to touch it directly.”
“That is technically something.”
Leonidas sealed the vial and placed it carefully in his pack.
They continued searching.
Most of the house contained preserved objects whose purpose none of them understood. Tools rested beside shelves of sealed bottles. Strange diagrams covered one wall beneath the sludge. A metal frame in another room held dozens of small crystals suspended by wires.
Pete found nothing alive.
Nethnarel found something that was not visible.
She stopped in the center of a chamber.
Everyone else continued several steps before realizing she was no longer following.
“What?” Grazim asked.
Nethnarel pointed.
“There is a chest.”
Hexen looked at the empty floor.
“There is not.”
“Yes.”
“There is floor.”
“There is a chest on the floor.”
Fendor narrowed his eyes.
Nothing.
Nethnarel moved one hand slowly through the air.
Her fingers stopped against an unseen surface.
Magic rippled.
“There.”
Leonidas approached.
He removed something from one of his pouches and sprinkled it through the air.
Fine particles settled upon nothing.
Then they outlined corners.
Edges.
A lid.
A large chest became visible as the dust clung to its surface.
Hexen looked at Leonidas.
“You had that too?”
“Yes.”
Fendor frowned.
“What else are you carrying?”
Leonidas smiled.
“Useful things.”
Nethnarel stayed several feet away from the chest.
No one suggested opening it by hand.
She raised two fingers.
A spectral hand formed beside her.
Mage Hand floated across the room.
It grasped the lid.
Lifted.
The chest exploded open.
Something enormous came out.
It had the body of a powerful beast and the head of a massive wolf, though nothing about its proportions belonged to any natural creature Hexen had ever seen.
It landed among them.
Frost erupted from its body.
The room froze.
Ice covered the floor in an instant. Shelves cracked. Glass containers disappeared beneath white rime.
Grazim raised his shield.
Isamu slid backward across the sudden ice and caught himself against the wall.
Hexen called his wolves.
Their answering howls filled the chamber.
Kaylor attacked.
Both of his swords moved.
The first struck the creature across the shoulder.
The second cut from the opposite side.
Power burned along both blades.
The wolf-headed guardian roared and turned toward him.
Fendor drew the Oathbow.
The shot looked perfect.
It was not.
The arrow missed.
Everyone noticed.
Fendor lowered the bow slightly.
Hexen stared at him.
Nethnarel stared at him.
Even Kaylor glanced over while avoiding the creature’s claws.
Fendor’s expression did not change.
“Continue fighting.”
Nethnarel smiled.
“You missed.”
“I am aware.”
“I wanted to make certain.”
Fendor drew another arrow.
It may have been his first clean miss in all the battles since their return.
The discovery was almost as disturbing as the monster.
Nethnarel raised one hand.
Chaos Bolt formed between her fingers.
Color twisted through the magic.
Blue.
Red.
Gold.
Green.
The bolt struck the wolf-headed creature with enough force to twist its entire body sideways.
And then the wild magic answered.
Something opened inside Nethnarel.
For one impossible moment, she understood what immortality felt like.
Not healing.
Not protection.
Certainty.
The absolute conviction that death had no claim upon her.
She stood perfectly still.
The feeling was glorious.
And deeply suspicious.
Nethnarel looked down at herself.
“I cannot die.”
Grazim struck the creature with his hammer.
“Please do not test that.”
Kaylor’s dancing blade crossed the room.
Leonidas fired Eldritch Blasts past it.
Fendor’s next arrow did not miss.
Neither did the one after that.
The monster released another blast of frost.
Hexen’s wolves scattered.
One was caught and thrown against the wall.
Another came in low and tore at the creature’s hind leg.
The guardian snapped at it.
Nethnarel moved.
Darkness gathered around both hands.
Two blades formed.
They were made from shadow rather than steel, their edges wavering like holes cut through the world.
Nethnarel looked at them.
Then at the wolf-headed creature.
The strange certainty still burned inside her.
She charged.
Fendor watched her run past.
“Perhaps we should have discouraged the immortality.”
“Too late,” Grazim said.
Nethnarel struck with the first Shadow Blade.
Then the second.
Dark magic cut through the frost surrounding the guardian.
Kaylor attacked from the opposite side.
Leonidas’s blasts hammered its shoulder.
Fendor put another arrow into its ribs.
The monster staggered.
Hexen’s surviving wolf lunged.
Its jaws closed upon the creature.
The guardian fell.
The wolf held on until it stopped moving.
Silence returned to the room.
Nethnarel stared at the shadowy blades in her hands.
The feeling of immortality began to fade.
She frowned.
“I believe I can die again.”
Hexen looked at her.
“Welcome back.”
Leonidas returned to the chest.
There was something inside it.
Not treasure.
A book.
Its cover was dark and stiff with age. Metal clasps held it shut. Symbols had been worked into the surface in patterns none of them could read.
Kaylor took one look and became still.
“Dragonborn.”
Everyone turned toward him.
He touched one of the symbols.
“This writing belonged to my people.”
“You can read it?” Grazim asked.
Kaylor shook his head.
“No.”
That disturbed him more than he admitted.
The script felt familiar.
Ancient.
Like recognizing a voice without understanding the words.
Leonidas opened the book.
The illustrations required no translation.
Figures had been drawn upon tables.
Humans.
Elves.
Dragonborn.
Creatures none of them recognized.
Some had been cut apart.
Others joined together.
Organs had been removed, replaced or altered. Symbols surrounded bodies still clearly shown as alive while procedures were performed upon them.
Hexen stopped turning pages.
“That is enough.”
Kaylor raised one hand.
His divine awareness spread through the chamber.
He had used the sense before to find hidden corruption.
This time the answer came from the book.
Powerful.
Ancient.
Evil.
Kaylor lowered his hand.
“Close it.”
Leonidas did.
“What do we do with it?”
“Destroy it,” Hexen said.
“Not until we know what it is,” Grazim replied.
Hexen looked at the cover.
“We know enough.”
“Someone may be able to read it.”
“And then?”
Grazim had no answer.
Nethnarel pointed toward the Bag of Holding.
“We place the horrible ancient book of evil experiments beside the horrible ancient shard of everlasting life.”
Grazim looked at her.
“When you say it that way—”
“There is another way?”
Leonidas put the book into the bag.
It disappeared with a small, unimpressive plop.
Everyone stared at the bag.
Nethnarel nodded.
“Excellent. Nothing about that feels dangerous.”
Rattling came from the hallway.
Metal against stone.
Then came the clank of armored footsteps.
Two figures entered the room.
They were skeletons.
Or had once been.
Heavy armor covered their bodies from skull to foot. Arcane symbols had been carved into the plates, glowing faintly through the layers of grime.
The creatures carried weapons that had remained as pristine as everything else in the house.
Their empty eye sockets burned.
Fendor fired.
The arrow struck armor.
Nothing happened.
Hexen’s wolves attacked.
Teeth caught bone and metal.
The guardians barely reacted.
One swung.
A wolf disappeared beneath the blow.
The second guardian advanced.
Fendor fired again.
The shot failed to penetrate.
His expression tightened.
He lowered one bow.
Reached for another.
The frost bow came into his hand.
“Different answer.”
He fired twice.
Both arrows struck the same guardian.
This time cracks opened through the old armor.
Kaylor charged between them.
Radiant power filled his swords.
He struck left.
Divine light exploded through one guardian.
He turned.
Struck right.
A second burst of holy power tore across the other.
Nethnarel watched.
“Efficient.”
The Arcane Guardians answered together.
Their weapons swept through the room.
Grazim caught one strike against his shield.
Isamu moved beneath another and pulled Leonidas clear before the blade could reach him.
Hexen’s remaining wolves attacked from behind.
Leonidas chose one guardian.
The mark of his Hex appeared across its armor.
Eldritch Blast struck.
Then another.
The creature reeled.
Its armor was already broken from Kaylor’s smite.
Leonidas nearly brought it down.
Nearly.
Grazim raised his holy symbol.
The distant bell sounded.
Toll the Dead rolled through the ancient house.
The guardian convulsed.
Across the room, Fendor drew.
His arrow passed through a break in the second guardian’s armor.
The undead construct collapsed.
For several confusing seconds, weapons, arrows, force and divine magic crossed the room so quickly that none of them would later agree which guardian had fallen first.
It did not matter.
Both remained on the floor.
Neither rose.
Grazim kept one hand raised toward the doorway until the final echo of Toll the Dead faded through the rear chambers.
Nothing else came.
Leonidas looked around.
“I vote we leave.”
Hexen nodded.
“A rare unanimous decision.”
They returned to the front doors.
Both stood wide open.
Daylight waited outside.
Kaylor approached carefully.
He extended one sword through the doorway.
Nothing happened.
He stepped forward.
Magic struck him.
A flash of light filled the entrance.
Kaylor was thrown backward.
Isamu caught his shoulder before he struck the floor.
Smoke curled from the dragonborn’s armor.
Nethnarel looked through the open doorway.
“The door is open.”
“Yes,” Kaylor said through clenched teeth.
“The house disagrees.”
Fendor examined the walls.
“The ward remains at the exit.”
Leonidas looked at Kaylor.
“Dispel it again?”
Kaylor rose.
The magic around the doorway brightened.
“No.”
Hexen pointed toward the southern wall.
“Then we make our own door.”
They did.
The ancient wall proved considerably less stubborn than the magic protecting the entrance.
Isamu found a weakened seam between stones.
Grazim and Kaylor broke it wider.
Hexen pulled loose entire sections of masonry.
Fendor and Leonidas cleared rubble while Nethnarel watched the opening for signs that the house intended to object.
It did not.
Eventually daylight appeared.
Then a hole.
Then a passage large enough to crawl through.
Nethnarel looked back toward the perfectly preserved front doorway.
“All that magic.”
She climbed through the broken wall.
“And it forgot about the side.”
The others followed.
They returned toward the butte.
The silence warned them first.
The surviving guards were gone.
Part of the ruined building had collapsed.
The rest was moving.
Something enormous twisted beneath the stones.
Hexen stopped.
“No.”
A worm rose from the wreckage.
Blood covered its jaws.
Fragments of armor lay among the rubble around it.
The last guards had not survived.
For a moment, no one moved.
The worm had eaten them.
Then Nethnarel raised one hand.
Fire gathered.
The explosion swallowed the remains of the building.
Fireball.
Flame rolled over the worm and across the stone.
The creature screamed and reared backward.
Hexen stepped beside Nethnarel.
His anger was quieter.
More dangerous.
He drew a line through the air.
Fire erupted from the ground.
A Wall of Fire rose across the ruins.
The worm found itself between flame and flame.
It twisted.
Burned.
Then did what the creatures had done before.
It burrowed.
The worm drove itself beneath the butte, tearing stone and earth apart as it disappeared.
Grazim listened.
The ground moved beneath him.
He raised his symbol.
The bell sounded.
Toll the Dead.
The note entered the earth.
The movement below slowed.
The bell sounded again.
Stopped.
The ground became still.
No one celebrated.
They searched what remained of the ruined building.
There were no survivors.
Hexen stood among the broken stones for a long time.
“We saved them.”
Grazim knew what he meant.
The patrol.
The handful who had survived the first worms.
The people they had fought to keep alive only a short time before.
“Yes,” Grazim said.
Hexen looked at the blood on the stones.
“For a while.”
There was nothing useful to say.
They gathered what they could.
Then they tried to rest again.
The dead city refused.
The ground began shaking.
Not one place.
Several.
Fendor was already standing when the first section of earth opened.
“Worms.”
More of them came from beneath the butte.
And among them rose something much larger.
The creature that emerged dwarfed the worms they had fought before.
Its body was thick enough to crush the remains of the building simply by turning. Rings of teeth surrounded a mouth broad enough to swallow a man whole.
The smaller worms had seemed monstrous.
This thing made them look young.
Nethnarel stared upward.
“Mother.”
No one asked how she knew.
The name fit.
The mother worm opened its mouth.
The heroes attacked.
Grazim called upon his divine power.
Golden forms appeared around him.
Warriors.
Guardians.
Half remembered soldiers made from light.
Spirit Guardians spread across the battlefield.
The nearest worm struck their circle and recoiled as radiant weapons cut into its flesh.
Nethnarel raised both hands.
Magic Missile.
Bolts of force erupted around her and streaked into the enormous creature’s face.
One after another they struck the folds around its mouth.
Kaylor sent his dancing sword ahead.
The blade swept toward the mother worm.
Missed.
The creature twisted faster than something of its size should have been able to move.
Kaylor followed with the Sword of Viciousness.
That weapon did not miss.
The blade opened a terrible wound along the mother’s side.
The creature screamed.
Leonidas pointed.
Hex settled upon the wounded flesh.
Eldritch Blast struck the worm’s head.
Another followed.
The force tore through the strange mushroom-shaped crown surrounding its mouth.
Pete appeared.
The familiar flew directly at one of the smaller worms.
Leonidas stared through Pete’s eyes.
“Pete.”
The familiar bit the worm.
The bite was not impressive.
It may have been the least impressive attack made by anyone during the entire battle.
The worm reacted anyway.
Its enormous head jerked.
Nethnarel turned.
“Did Pete just hurt it?”
Leonidas looked extremely pleased.
“Yes.”
Pete circled for another attack.
The worm snapped at him.
Pete missed his bite.
Then vanished.
Hexen looked at Leonidas.
“A tactical withdrawal?”
“He is a scout.”
“Of course.”
Nethnarel summoned the meteors.
Small spheres of fire appeared around her.
They began circling.
One shot forward.
Then another.
They struck a worm and exploded.
Fendor raised the frost bow.
His arrows crossed the battlefield one after another, burying themselves in exposed flesh.
Cold spread around each wound.
The mother worm attacked Kaylor.
His dancing sword returned.
Missed again.
Kaylor looked at it.
“You are having a difficult day.”
He attacked with the Sword of Viciousness.
The blade tore deeply into the creature.
Blood covered Kaylor’s hands.
Grazim reached the mother from the opposite side.
His warhammer struck.
The impact shook through the worm’s body.
Behind him, Hexen’s wolves surrounded one of the lesser creatures.
They attacked together.
Teeth found the injuries opened by arrows and magic.
The worm thrashed.
One wolf was thrown aside.
The others stayed on it.
They brought the creature down.
Hexen changed.
The man expanded into the cave bear.
He charged.
The mother worm met him.
Its jaws closed around the bear.
Hexen roared.
The worm shook him and threw him across the ruins.
He struck hard enough to break stone.
The bear rose.
Angrier.
Fendor fired twice.
Both arrows struck the remaining target.
The first opened a wound beside Kaylor’s previous attack.
The second drove deeper.
The worm began to collapse.
Almost.
Fendor reached for another arrow.
Kaylor was already there.
The Sword of Viciousness rose.
The mother worm turned toward him.
Kaylor brought the blade down.
The final strike opened the creature from the damaged side into the center of its body.
The worm convulsed.
Its enormous head struck the earth.
The remaining length of its body twisted once.
Then stopped.
Silence returned to the butte.
For several breaths, no one moved.
Then Pete became visible above the corpse.
Hexen returned to human form.
He was bleeding.
He pointed at the familiar.
“That one bite made the difference.”
Leonidas nodded solemnly.
“I agree.”
Nethnarel looked at the dead worm.
“Without Pete, we would surely have perished.”
Pete disappeared.
Fendor lowered the frost bow.
“He has become unbearable.”
“He cannot speak,” Grazim said.
“That has not prevented it.”
They searched the battlefield.
The worms had dragged up more than stone.
Coins had been scattered through the earth and rubble.
Thousands of them.
Copper.
Silver.
Gold.
The exact denominations became difficult to separate as they gathered the hoard, but the combined count was enormous—roughly eleven thousand five hundred coins mixed among the remains.
Hexen stared at the pile.
“We are becoming wealthy.”
Nethnarel looked toward the ruined city.
“We are also becoming surrounded by increasingly large worms.”
“Both can be true.”
Leonidas found something else.
A wand.
He cleaned the dirt from its surface.
Magic immediately answered.
Nethnarel looked at it.
“That is not minor.”
Leonidas smiled.
“No.”
“What does it do?”
“Lightning.”
“How much lightning?”
Leonidas examined the Wand of Lightning Bolts.
“Enough.”
Nethnarel nodded.
“I dislike that answer.”
“You dislike most answers.”
“Only the dangerous ones.”
Leonidas put the wand away.
The evil book remained inside the Bag of Holding.
So did the Shard of Everlasting Life.
Now thousands of coins had joined them.
No one considered the implications of that arrangement.
Not yet.
The heroes looked toward the dead city.
The green crevasse still waited somewhere among the ruins.
The magical storm still hung over the ancient temple.
The strange house remained behind them with a hole broken through its southern wall.
And beneath the streets, there were undoubtedly more things waiting to rise.
Grazim had seen enough.
“We return to the village.”
No one argued.
They carried what they could.
The journey back felt longer.
Not because of the distance.
Because they finally had time to think.
They had entered the ruined city looking for answers.
Instead they had found parasites living inside dead men.
Creatures made from salt.
Worms large enough to consume entire patrols.
A house preserved by ancient magic.
A book filled with experiments upon the living.
And one more weapon powerful enough to call lightning from the air.
The world before their deaths had left dangerous things behind.
Some had been buried.
Some had been sealed away.
Some were apparently waiting inside chests.
As the village came into sight, Hexen walked beside Grazim.
“Do you believe anyone there can read it?”
“The book?”
“Yes.”
“I hope so.”
“That is different from believing it.”
Grazim looked toward the distant homes.
Smoke rose from chimneys.
Living smoke.
Cooking fires.
People.
After the dead city, the sight felt almost impossible.
“We will ask.”
Kaylor walked ahead of them.
The dragonborn had been quiet since seeing the ancient script.
The book belonged to some forgotten age of his people.
Perhaps to his own age.
Perhaps, somewhere among those terrible pages, there waited another piece of whatever they had once been.
Nethnarel glanced toward the Bag of Holding.
“We should establish a rule.”
Fendor looked at her.
“What rule?”
“No more evil ancient objects.”
Leonidas laughed.
Grazim did not.
“That seems reasonable.”
Nethnarel looked surprised.
“You agreed.”
“We already have two.”
“That is precisely why we require the rule.”
Isamu looked toward the village.
“We should learn what the first two are before finding a third.”
They continued walking.
For once, the road ahead contained no monsters.
No moving corpses.
No worms.
No impossible doors.
Only the village.
Rest.
And, if they were fortunate, someone capable of translating a language dead for centuries.
The Heroes of the New Beginning returned carrying thousands of ancient coins, a Wand of Lightning Bolts, a glowing sample Leonidas had insisted upon keeping, and a book powerful enough for Kaylor’s divine senses to recognize its evil.
They had survived the house.
They had survived the worms.
They had not yet learned what either had been protecting.
Inside the Bag of Holding, the ancient book waited.
Its metal clasps remained closed.
Its dead language remained silent.
For now.