Chapter 36 - Hidden Dangers

Swinging open the door at the base of the stairs down from the Guard Post, Cadryn held little doubt that the soaking waif huddled over the coals of the fire pit was Royalty. A moist schlorp bounced off the walls of the small chamber as she shifted her feet, shaking from the cold and wet. The room, little more than a place for travelers to avail themselves of in weather like this while paying their toll, held only a single table with a lamp and four chairs. Cadryn pulled out one and dragged it over to the fire,

“Here you go, you need to empty out those boots or you’ll get the rot, if you don’t freeze first.”

“Oh, I wo-uldn’t w-ant t-hat,” the traveler said, voice stuttering with chill. Plopping down on the chair she started pulling at her boots, managing to get them off with some effort. Cadryn took them from her hands and set them by the fire to dry, then added two pieces of wood to the coals, sending a plume of sparks up the chimney. “Thanks,” she said, voice steadying.

“Not a problem, bad night to be on the road,” he replied.

“When you got to go, you go,” the woman stated evenly, and pulling back her hood, shrugged off the oiled leather stalking coat she wore. Her hair was short, a dark blond, about the color of old parchment in the rekindled fire. She could be Cadryn’s sister, for the green and gold of her eyes, a small mouth above a tiny chin twisted into something closer to a smirk than a smile.

“Do I know you?” Cadryn found himself asking.

“Doubt it, just passing through,” she said, and standing, pulled another chair over to the fire to hang her cloak over, her arm jerking at an unexpected pain as she did. “So, what do I owe the Empire for the pleasure of drying off?”

The fee to overnight, for a traveler without mount or cargo, was one silver. However, the more Cadryn looked, the worse off she seemed: there was a dark bruise on the side of her jaw the shadow had hidden, several of her nails were split, and the flinch told of an injury to the ribs. Chewing his cheek Cadryn shook his head slowly.

“No charge tonight, it’s not fit for man or beast out there. Just get dry, and be safe.”

“Will do,” she said, settling back onto a chair, “Keeper . . .”

“Bence, Cadryn Bence,” he said.

“I’ll remember it.”

The door at the top of the stairs swung open, and a voice called down.

“Cad, it’s time, you better be ready!” It was Mareth, now returned.

“I’m coming,” he yelled back. Turning for the stairs, he felt a sudden fear tugging at his mind. Looking back, he only saw the young woman, warming her hands at the fire.

***

Cadryn insisted on a torch for himself, and Mareth joked that he was just jealous of her staff. Maybe he was, given how disturbing and lightless the underground chambers of the Neeft could get. Managing to run from the Guard Post to the Citadel in between the rain bands of the storm left them mostly dry as Cadryn pushed open the vast metal doors leading into a place the Imperial survey plate labeled: The Larder & Fire Pits

“Umm, this isn’t the way to the Underground Cells,” Cadryn said, swinging his torch from the left to right, and doing nothing against the vast, yawning darkness of the hallway ahead. A smell like old blood and spoiled tallow rolled out and it left the taste of acid in his mouth.

“It, is not,” Mareth admitted, touching the tip of her staff to his torch, the flame swelled. After a moment, she pulled away her staff, and began to whisper words of power to the dancing sphere atop it while walking down the center of the long chamber. Pointing with the staff, smaller shards of flame sailed free from their parent, zipping into dark recesses spread at regular intervals along the long wall of the gallery. Flames, low and smoky at first, burst into life, spreading over wine-colored crystalline rocks below massive, rusting cauldrons.

The crystals began to glow with heat, kindled by the magic, or the flame, Cadryn was uncertain. The room filled with a deep, bloody light, and became all the more horrible for being able to see. Everywhere lay massive tables, strewn with rusting carving implements, knifes, cleavers, forks, and several grinders, still glistening with ancient fat and bone. Everywhere the dark stains of blood marred the tables and stone floor alike.

“Yeah,” Cadryn said, slowly moving forward to follow Mareth, “I do not like this place.”

“Because you’re sane,” Mareth replied from the end of the room. “Don’t worry, I hate it too.”

Jogging over to her, Cadryn coughed as the cloud of burning dust and old offal that lay between them stung his eyes and throat. “Why then, are we here?”

“Orders,” she said, moving into the darkness of a smaller hallway, “Felina reported seeing something moving in the Larder.”

“Who’s Larder, exactly,” Cadryn whispered, his eyes darting from one side room full of oddly shaped containers to the next. One held nothing but rows of large pots on shelves, the lids sealed with wax and some kind of magical glyphs that reflected the light in the bright blues of an empty sky in summer. The next, human sized bundles, wrapped in waxed paper hung from the ceiling on rusting chains. Each room threw the sound of the footfalls back at them as a slinking killer waiting to strike.

“This is one of the newer parts of the Neeft,” Mareth began, her voice nearly conversational despite the environment. “Two occupants ago, a Mage possessed by a greater demon of Hunger, Vojja-Lakii the Fleshreaver, claimed the tower as his home. He repurposed the inner keep of Oathkeeper Jalisco’s fortifications into . . . this place.”

“And what a lovely home it is,” Cadryn said, hopping to distract himself from the progressively more unsettling rooms of the Larder. They stopped at a T-intersection, the hallway going left and right. Mareth moved her staff slowly in each direction, watching the way the flame atop it moved.

“This part is just a big circuit, Felina claims she heard something moving around in a room down there,” she pointed off to the right. “Captain Vaast wanted me to check the whole place out just to be safe.”

“So . . . left first?”

“Left it is.”