The Phoenix Unchained (45 page)

After the history lecture, Mistress Amalgar’s partner, Guide Eredor, gave a shorter speech on safe conduct within the caves. Harrier paid more attention this time. They were told to stay close together and always keep either Mistress Amalgar or Guide Eredor in sight at all times.

Then they walked up the short path that led to the entrance.

TIERCEL was surprised at how much colder it was inside the cave than out, though the lanterns set at frequent intervals along their path kept it from being dark. Once they were all inside, their guides explained the cave system in detail, and how it had been infested by Creatures of the Dark for thousands of years before Kellen and Idalia had found and destroyed them.

Everything looked vaguely familiar. He’d thought it might.
These were the caves he and Harrier had dreamed about last night. Obviously someone was sending them a message, and one Tiercel was determined to answer, no matter what Harrier might have to say about it. He was sure it hadn’t come from the same creature who’d chased them around the alleys, and from what he knew about the Creatures of the Dark, they wouldn’t waste their time laying elaborate traps. They’d just eat someone.

He was pretty sure of that.

HE’D hoped to be able to take Harrier and sneak away from the rest of the party in order to find the place he’d dreamed about the night before, but Amalgar and Eredor apparently had years of experience in keeping visitors from wandering off and getting lost, and there was no chance to slip away. Despite his disappointment and frustration, Tiercel found himself being drawn in by the tour. They walked along ancient trails and pathways cut into the living rock. Some were obviously man-made—or made by
something
, anyway—while others were obviously newer, simply marked out by the guides across the floor of larger caverns. Amalgar said that once there had been cities and villages of Darkspawn here, though they had all been destroyed in the ancient battles against the Dark, and Tiercel could certainly believe it. Though they were only shown a small portion of the caves, the cave system honeycombed the mountains in which Ysterialpoerin was nestled.

He gazed down a particularly interesting passageway, one he was pretty sure he remembered from his dream. It was roped off, and marked with a “Do Not Enter” sign.

“What’s down there?” he asked Eredor.

“More caverns,” Eredor said, smiling, “and some particularly nasty drop-offs, which is why that section is closed. Kellen Knight-Mage might have been able to dance on the blade of a sword, but
we don’t expect our visitors to.” He put a hand on Tiercel’s arm, urging him to rejoin the others.

“SO that was a cave,” Harrier said, blinking and shivering as he followed Tiercel back out into the evening sunlight.

“Did it seem . . . familiar to you?” Tiercel asked, taking care to keep his voice low. A guilty silence from Harrier was his only reply.

“I’m going to go back in there,” Tiercel said. “I think I can find the part I dreamed about now.”

“And get killed? Eaten? Die the way Simera did?” Harrier demanded brutally.

“I don’t think so,” Tiercel said.

“You never think.”

They’d reached the bottom of the cave trail by now. They’d been at the back of the group of visitors, and were hanging even further back now. Tiercel glanced back up at the cave entrance. There was no door, of course, but a wooden panel had been dragged into place in front of the cave opening, indicating that it was closed to visitors for the day.

“I’ve done nothing
but
think since Kindling, Harrier. I
think
this is the right thing to do now.”

Harrier sighed and rubbed the back of his neck. “Even if it were—and I’m not saying that it is—how could we do it? There are no more tours today. And you didn’t have much luck getting away from the one we were on. I saw you trying.”

Tiercel grinned. “The tours may be over, but the park isn’t closed. You should have read the guidebook. The park doesn’t close until Second Night Bells—the Second Hour of Night. We can sneak back up here when it’s dark.”

Harrier snorted. “I don’t think we’d be the first people to think of doing something like that.”

Tiercel poked him in the ribs. “But we’ve got years of experience. Like the time we snuck into that old foundry, remember? That was your idea.”

Harrier sighed. “It was
your
idea. I can’t even remember why we did it. I
do
remember the dogs, though. Why in the name of the Light would anybody guard an
abandoned
foundry? It isn’t like there’d be something there that anybody would want to steal. . . .”

“The point is, we did that and we can do this. I just want to look around and see if the inside of the cave really does look like what we dreamed. Then we can go back to the city,” he said reassuringly.

“Okay. Right. Fine. Let’s go get something to eat while we’re waiting.”

“Again?”

Harrier grinned at him. “It may be my last meal.”

DESPITE Harrier’s misgivings, it wasn’t actually all that difficult to get back into the cave.

They waited a bell and a half—the Temple rang out the bells, just as if they were back in Armethalieh—and just as First Night Bells was ringing, they made their way back toward the cavern mouth. It had already been fully dark for quite some time, and the air was filled with the scent of flowers from the ornamental gardens; the night-blooming varieties had the heaviest perfume.

They had rented a lantern from one of the lantern-booths, but they’d blown it out as soon as they could do so inconspicuously. A number of the park’s patrons had left at sunset, and those that remained had gravitated either to the extensive gardens—which were brilliantly lit for evening—or to attend the Evening Litany of the Light in Imrathalion Temple. The building was almost as beautiful from the outside at night as it was on the inside during the day.
At night, the light streamed outward through the many windows of colored glass set into its walls, turning the entire building into a giant ornamental lantern of a sort.

Harrier paused for just a moment to admire it, one part of his mind thinking that with the Temple so brightly lit, anybody in or around it wouldn’t be able to see anything outside it—such as the two of them. Then he turned away, following his friend—his idiot friend—into the dark. Tiercel always made his plans seem so logical. That was always the trouble.

They reached the wooden barrier, groping their way over its surface as if they were blind, because by now they were very far away from the lights and any light of their own would attract far too much attention. The barrier was pressed right across the cave mouth, and they had to move it in order to get around behind it. It made a grating sound as they shifted it, and Harrier’s heart hammered guiltily in his chest. He didn’t think even Tiercel could talk his way out of the situation if they were caught.

But no one caught them, and they slipped behind the wooden panel, shifting it back into place behind them.

“DO you mind lighting that thing now, o great and powerful High Mage?” Harrier asked, when they’d spent a few minutes groping their way along the path by touch. The lanterns that had been lit for the daytime visitors had all been doused for night, and the cave was absolutely lightless. Even though—as far as Harrier remembered—the corridor was straight and the path beneath his feet was smooth, he still found himself staggering and stumbling, bumping into Tier-cel and the walls. It was blacker than the back of his closet in here, and he had the spooky feeling that there wasn’t any air, though he’d been fine when they’d been down here before.

“Oh. Yeah. Sure.” Tiercel sounded a little embarrassed. He stepped away from Harrier, and a moment later the lantern glowed to life.

With the light from the lantern it seemed a little easier to breathe, though it didn’t really show them much more of the cave. If Tiercel showed any sign at all of casting one of his MageLight spells, though, Harrier vowed, he was going to smack him so hard he’d forget all about being a High Mage.

They quickly returned to the main cavern they’d been in before. It had taken the tour about an hour to reach it the last time, with all the stops and starts; the two of them, alone, got there in half that time.

According to Amalgar and Eredor, there’d been either a big battle or a village of Endarkened creatures here once; no one remembered which. Though Tiercel’s lantern cast only a few feet of light in their immediate vicinity, Harrier remembered that the floor here was as smooth and even as if it had been built by human hands, and the sloping walls of the cave were covered with a thick glittery something that looked like frost. They’d all been told not to touch it, but he had, and it had crumbled under his fingers like salt. Standing in the middle of the cavern now, neither of them could see the walls at all by the light of their single lantern.

“I think we want to go this way,” Tiercel said. His voice had a creepy flat sound in the cave, as if it ought to echo and didn’t. Harrier had noticed that the last time they were down here. In some places in the cave, sounds had echoed so much it was deafening. In others—like this cavern—sounds were weirdly flat.

“You mean, past the rope that blocks off that section of the cave from people going into it?” Harrier said resignedly.