Dark Sun: Prism Pentad 1 - The Verdent Passage (23 page)

“The dwarf who was with you at the slave auction?” Ktandeo demanded.

Agis put his wine aside with a sour face. “When you look at what Tithian knows and what
Caro could have told him, it seems likely,” Agis said. “I still find it difficult to
accept. Caro's been loyal to my family for two hundred years.”

“You're overestimating the strength of a slave's loyalty,” Sadira said.

“Perhaps, but Caro's focus is serving the Asticles family. Do you know what it would mean
if he betrayed me?”

“Eternal damnation seems a high price to pay for betrayal,” Ktandeo agreed. “Still, Athas
is full of dwarven banshees and we have no way of knowing what Tithian may have offered
him. I hope you had enough sense not to tell your servant where you are now.”

Agis nodded. “I sent him home the same day of my meeting with Tithian. He hasn't seen us
since.”

“Let's hope so,” Ktandeo answered. He stared at his cane's pommel. “What you saw in
Tithian's memory is worrisome.” He looked to Sadira. “I owe you an apology, my dear. You
were rightÑnothing is more important than killing Kalak, and as soon as possible.”

“Why?” Sadira and Agis asked the question simultaneously.

Ktandeo raised his hand and shook his head. “Let us pray you never learn the answer,” he
said, switching his gaze to Agis. “Now, what do you make of Tithian's proposal? Surely you
don't think the high templar can be trusted?”

“Only to do what is best for himself,” Agis replied. “But I do think he's sincere about
working with you.”

“Then you're a fool,” answered Ktandeo.

“Perhaps not,” Agis countered. “Kalak has put Tithian in a hopeless situation. He has no
choice except to turn to the king's enemies for help.”

Sadira added, “At the same time, he warned Agis to watch himself, so-”

A handful of muffled cries sounded in the plaza outside the wineshop, interrupting Sadira.
Though the curtain remained drawn, it was not thick enough to muffle the panicked voices
The half-elf was rising to investigate the noise when the barman stuck his head around the
edge of the curtain. In his hand, he held the satchel in which Sadira had been carrying
her spellbook when Radurak captured her.

“Templars!” the barman hissed. He shoved the satchel into her hands and left.

Sadira turned to Ktandeo. “Where did he get this?” she gasped, slinging it over her
shoulder. She was so delighted to have it back that she was hardly concerned about the
templars.

“From Radurak, of course,” the old man answered curtly. “There's no time to discuss that
now. Tithian offer was bait, and you two swallowed it!”

The sorcerer tipped the stone bench onto its side. Beneath it, a cobweb-filled stairway
descended into the murky earth at a precariously steep angle. To Sadira's elven vision,
the first few feet of the stone stairs were outlined in blue tones emitted by the cool
rock. Beyond that, the passage was as dark to her as it was to her human companions.

“Where does this go?” Agis demanded.

Before anyone could answer, the harsh, demanding voice of a templar sounded outside the
curtain. Without waiting for Ktandeo's command, the half-elf took Agis's hand and led him
into the stairwell. As the old sorcerer followed, he pulled the bench back into place,
plunging the stairwell into darkness. The red hues of her companions' warm bodies and the
blue hues of the cold stone provided all the illumination Sadira needed, but she knew her
human friends would be completely blind in the darkness.

“I can cast a light spell,” she whispered.

“Absolutely not!” came the old man's reply. “Go!”

The half-elf started down the stairs, guiding Agis by the hand. Ktandeo followed a step
behind, his cane quietly tapping each stair before he stepped on it. As they descended,
the silky filaments of the cobwebs slipped over Sadira's bare shoulders like a gossamer
shawl, sending shivers of trepidation down her spine. Several times imagining that
something had crawled beneath her chemise, she had stifled the urge to slap at her back.

Worse than the cobwebs was the thick layer of dust covering the stairs. With each step,
small puffs billowed up to tickle her nose and throat, vexing he with the urge to sneeze
and cough. The dust was so deep that the edges of the stairs were slick and treacherous.
Several times, Sadira slipped. Only the strong grip of Agis's warm hand prevented her from
tumbling into the murkiness.

After many moments of hurried descent, they reached the bottom of the stairwell. There the
passage changed into a corridor, which then ended almost immediately at a stone wall.
Sadira turned around, conscious of a musty smell and the refreshing coolness of
subterranean air.

“We're at the bottom,” she whispered.

A loud clunk echoed from the upper end of the stairs. Far above, a narrow shaft of light
poured into the stairwell. A black-robed templar appeared at the entrance.

“Go on,” Agis whispered.

“It's a dead end,” Sadira replied.

“Wrong,” Ktandeo hissed. “Be quiet while I take care of our friends.”

The old man calmly waited as the templars lit torches and began descending the stairs. The
heat of the small flames overpowered Sadira's elven vision with painful white light, but
her eyes quickly adjusted back to normal. As
the first templar reached the halfway point, a crooked smile crossed Ktandeo's lips.
“Cover your ears.”

The old man pointed the tip of his cane up the stairwell and uttered a single word, “Nok”
A deep red light blossomed in the heart of the glassy pommel.

Sadira gasped as a strange tingle stirred deep inside her belly. The half-elf clasped her
hands over her ears just as Ktandeo whispered, “Ghostfire.”

A tremendous blast slammed through the corridor. Dust and stone chips showered down on the
trio, and the air itself beat against them. A geyser of nebulous light shot up the
stairwell. At first it merely washed over the men on the stairs, illuminating their
frightened faces in a roiling, ruby-hued stream. For more than a second, the astonished
templars remained motionless inside the crimson ray, their mouths gaping open and their
hands clutching their short swords.

The spell began to fade. The skin of those caught within its beam grew ashen and flaky.
Flesh poured off their bodies in a fine powder, and screams filled the stairwell. Some men
tried to flee up the stairs, and others charged downward. Their efforts did little good,
for as the light grew dimmer, their hair, eyes, and even their entrails turned to ash. By
the time the stairwell returned to darkness and Sadira was once again relying on her elven
vision, all that remained of the templars was a mass of charred bones clattering down the
steps. “The cane drew its energy through us!” Agis gasped. “What kind of magic is that?”
Sadira demanded. Ktandeo had never told her it was possible to draw magical energy from
animal life.

Ktandeo let out a fatigued gasp. He reached out for Agis's shoulder, but could not find it
in the darkness. Sadira stepped past the noble and slipped her shoulder under the old
man's arm. To her eyes, the color of his body had faded from deep red to pink. Ktandeo's
magic had apparently drawn most of its energy from the old man himself.

Supporting himself on Sadira's shoulder, the sorcerer staggered to the end of the corridor
and tapped his cane against a stone. “Push there,” he gasped.

With her free arm, Sadira guided Agis forward, and he gave the stone a shove. A door-sized
slab pivoted open in front of them as more templars stepped into the top of the stairwell.
The king's men descended rapidly, cursing and kicking at the bones of their dead fellows.

“Take them alive!” yelled a commanding voice.

Sadira prodded Agis through door. “We should have killed Caro when we had the chance.”

“This only proves it wasn't him,” objected Agis. He doesn't know where we are.

“Quiet!” Ktandeo gasped, pushing Sadira through the door. Once they were clear, Sadira
quickly inspected their dark surroundings while Agis closed the door. Ahead lay a silent
cavern smelling of mildew and decay. It was filled with the round, cool-blue shapes of
rocky pillars rising more than ten feet overhead to disappear into a yellowish mass of
gauzy filament that hung from the ceiling.

“Nok,” Ktandeo said again, speaking the word that activated his cane, then named the spell
he wished to use. “Forestlight.”

The pommel of his cane began to glow. Sadira blinked, and then she saw that the obsidian
ball was surrounded by a small circle of eerie violet light. She felt a faint tingle in
her gut as the cane drew energy from her.

Muffled voices began to sound through the stone slab at their backs. Ktandeo led them
away, moving at a painfully slow pace. Sadira knew he would never be able to outrun the
templars. Fortunately the trio had already traveled many yards into the pillar forest by
the time the hidden door behind them began to scrape open.

The old sorcerer ran the palm of his hand over his cane's pommel, and the violet light
faded away. Behind them, the torchlit forms of templars began to pour into the cavern.

“You're our eyes now,” Ktandeo whispered, pulling Sadira to the front of the party. “I'll
hold your hand Agis, you hold my cane. Keep on eye on what's happening behind us.”

Sadira glanced over her shoulder and saw that the number of templars gathering outside the
door had risen to more than a dozen. “Where are we going?”

Grasping her by the shoulders, Ktandeo oriented her so that she faced exactly the same
direction as him “Straight ahead. Count fifty pillars and stop.”

The half-elf took her master's hand and started walking at the fastest pace she judged
Ktandeo could endure.

A templar's strident voice echoed through the quiet cavern. “They went this way! Ten
silver for every man here if we catch them alive. Ten lashes if they escape!”

“Agis?” Sadira asked, continuing forward. She did not look back, for she did not warn her
elven vision washed out by the heat of the templars torches.

“They're following our path,” he reported.

“Run!” Ktandeo hissed.

“ButÑ”

“Do it!” he ordered.

Holding Ktandeo's hand, Sadira set off at a jog, her steps falling silently on the cold
stone floor. Behind her, the old sorcerer stumbled and scraped along, his breath coming in
unsteady, rasping wheezes. Agis brought up the rear, his footfalls muffled and steady.
Though their passage could hardly be called hushed, the half-elf did not worry about the
noise they caused. Their pursuers were making so much noise that she and her friends could
have spoken aloud without concern.

After Sadira passed the correct number of pillars, she stopped. “This is it,” she said.
“How close are they, Agis?”

“Three city blocks. Maybe less,” he answered. “It's hard to tell.”

“How are they following us?” Sadira asked “Cilops?”

"I don't see any sign of handlers or animals, Agis said, scraping his foot along the rocky
floor.

The old sorcerer hefted his walking stick. “Let's see if I can't slow them down a bit.”

Fearing Ktandeo was too weak to use the cane again, Sadira pushed it down. “Allow me.”

Kneeling at the base of the pillar, the sorceress fetched a piece of charcoal from the
shoulder satchel that held her spellbook, then traced a series of flame-shaped runes at
the bottom of the column.

“We'd better hurry. They're running hard,” Agis advised. “I can almost see their faces.
They must be only a block or two back by now.”

Sadira pointed at the ceiling and summoned the energy she needed for the spell. To her
surprise, a large circle of the gauzy filament overhead shriveled up and turned black. The
filament had to be some sort of strange plant. Thankful that Ktandeo could not see what
she had done, Sadira spoke her incantation and rose.

Agis whispered, “They'll see us soon.”

“I'm ready,” Sadira answered, also whispering. “Now where, Ktandeo?”

“Twenty pillars to the right,” the old man gasped.

“Let's go!” Agis said.

Sadira took Ktandeo's hand and led him away. They had traveled only six pillars when a
templar cried out, “I see them!”

“I hope your spell works,” Ktandeo huffed.

“You'll be proud,” Sadira promised, continuing forward.

A few seconds later, a loud crack echoed behind them.

Sadira looked over her shoulders and saw a pillar of golden, fluidlike flame consume the
leader of the templar column. The man screamed and whirled in a wild dance of agony,
throwing great globs of golden flame all around.

The commander shouted orders for the rear of the column to circle around and take the
lead. As the templars obeyed, more sprays of flame erupted from the base of the pillar,
shooting directly for the nearest men. More templars burst into flame. Within moments the
cavern was glowing with golden light and echoing with anguished screams. The templars fell
into complete disarray.

“Let's go,” Agis said. “Their confusion won't last forever.”

“Wait a moment,” Sadira replied, motioning her companions to hide behind a pillar.

She pointed a hand upward and summoned the energy for another spell. Again, a circle of
the gauzy flora overhead shriveled and turned black. This time, the small skeleton of some
long-dead cavern animal tumbled from the ceiling and landed at Ktandeo's feet. The thing
had a flat, circular skull with four eye sockets and six legs.

Ktandeo's eyes went from the skeleton to the ceiling, then the old man gasped. “Look what
you did!”

Sadira cringed at the reprimand, knowing it would eventually result in a long lecture,
then cast her spell. A glimmering yellow light, resembling a distant torch, appeared
amidst the pillars to the right of the templars. It slowly began to drift away.

For the next few moments, Sadira held her breath and hoped the simple conjuration would be
enough to fool the templars. She had intended to enhance the deception by adding ghostly
voices to the phantom torch, but that was out of the question now that Ktandeo had seen
how delicate the strange plantlife on the ceiling was.