And so it was that, outraged by the great chaos, Einr picked the spear offered to him. Wielding it, he smote the Old Sun, sending its great carcass crashing into the center of Uduru. He and his siblings built Ea with it. With the guts and flesh, they crafted the earth and erected the firmament. The bones, they used to build the mountains; the blood, to make the seas and lakes. The skull became Stigr, the left eye Dani. Vigg ate the right eye for knowledge. The heart Einr handed to Borvi so he could hide it away. What remained, they fed to the Fire, but two ribs wouldn't burn. They took them and with them and some of the ash, they built the Val, which still stands today.
Einr sat on a golden throne, and all the Gods bowed to him. Such was the beginning of the Einerann Age.
- From the Book of Origins, Chapter 1
The passage had been more difficult than expected.
Tener, First Archmage of the Tenerann Order, leaned heavily against the slick wall, waiting for her breath to come back. She didn't need to look to know what happened to the rest of the group. The way their life-forces had sputtered and faded from her perceptions told her enough.
She grinned. Exactly as planned. This was an unprecedented venture, with a wild prize at the end. Why share it? Much better to omit that the spells of protection she and her erstwhile companions came up with to survive the transfer were just short of being enough.
"That's on you," she panted. "Should have studied more."
The blackened bones littering the floor didn't answer, but she could imagine her esteemed colleagues shaking their fists and pulling at their hair and beards. That was what she'd do in their position. She giggled.
Feeling better, she pulled herself upright. It was dark there, and cold, the chill seeping through even her heavily-warded robes. Pulling at the magic roiling into her was an almost instinctive act. Access, Weave, Manifest. The steps of casting spell came to her as easy as breathing, the result of one hundred and fifty years of practice and study. It helped that she was a genius too.
The flow of magic felt different for everyone. For her, it was a flow of wispy water surging from her heart, flowing just beneath her skin as a refreshing wave, until it reached where she wanted it to go. Then, it erupted, water breaking through a dam, the dry land that was reality changing shape before it.
Flames ran and licked across the exterior of her robes, settling in a shifting, flickering cover. It did well to push back the chill, but Tener shuddered a little all the same. No matter how many times she cast spells, it was always a small delight.
With the cold held at bay, she looked around. She had landed in a bare hall, as wide as a royal antechamber. Rock, half-melted and slick, formed both walls and ceiling. Even if there wasn't a drop of water to be seen, it looked as if it had been polished to a wet sheen by centuries of exposure to the depths, small signs of brickwork emerging among the waves and curves like an afterthought. Dim, greenish light suffused the place, making the stone shimmer from a noxious green to an almost bony white with little rhyme or reason. Fog covered the floor at ankle height, the sad remains of her group barely visible on glistening blocks of the same material. The air, stale as a tomb, was heavy with damp, wobbling and shimmering here and there as if touched by a great heat. Silence, heavy, old, cold, hung over everything. Only a strange sound lingered, like a hum, just beyond true perception.
And yet, none of those was the strangest feature. The walls, the mist, even the air. They seemed just slightly out of focus, as if seen through a slanted lens. Dust-like fragments, shimmering green and black, seeped lazily away from every surface, every single thing. Here and there, whole sections of walls, floor and mist just shifted away from their place, curling in vaporous, insubstantial-looking appendages that mingled and mixed together, and wouldn't look out of place in a dream. It all gave the place the appearance of being constantly rotting, just a wisp of wind away from disappearing.
Tener felt a thrill. It was the place. They hadn't been wrong. Well, she hadn't been.
Eager, her eyes avidly roamed the place for a passage. There was one right in front of her, so glaring that just for a moment she wondered how she missed it. Stairs, mist flowing down as a breath, as a river. The way down, to her prize.
She checked her baggage. Good, both mana tanks had survived the transfer unscathed.
Without a look at what remained of her companions, Tener hurried forward.
The light didn't relent as she descended. It lit large, glistening pave stones, cobbled together into steps that were just a touch too large for her very human feet. Some were slanted, some mashed together, some cracked, some looking as if they could slide away at any moment, as if a great earthquake had shaken the whole place.
Tener gave a sly smile. She knew better. She kept descending.
She never was much of an archeologist. Her interests laid in what was useful to her at each particular moment in time. Still, even she couldn't keep herself in check when the corridor ended and she stepped out.
The hall was gargantuan, the work of some primordial titans of the Dark Times. The walls, cavernous and glistening, were so distant that she couldn't make sense of the proportions. A jumbled, crazy forest of pillars filled a colossal chasm. Broken, slanted, cracked, they disappeared into a gloomy dark both above and beneath, floor and ceiling impossible to see. Glyphs, some small as pinpricks, some as large as buildings, covered the wet stone. They seemed to flow and change as she watched, slithering in new shapes and configurations like worms. Tener had to rip her eyes away from them, just as an ache was starting to burn behind her eyes.
Feeling dizzy, she stepped back, pushing herself against the wall. It was horribly damp even through her burning robes, but it helped her to ground herself.
The whispers came soon after. Wispy little words, shreds of voices just outside of being intelligible, clawing at her mind, raking at her conscience. They came with the cold, as if someone, something, was breathing against her ear.
Teren watched the world start to spin. The floor seemed to buckle and twist beneath her feet. The stone melted, glistening tentacles grasping at her feet. She took a wobbly step, her boot squelching as she sank up to the ankle. Something was crawling on her skin, something with many little stings as feet. Her blood oozed through her pores, her eyes, her ears, pooling at her feet. She had to get it back! She had to get on her knees and hands and lick and gulp and…
With a tremendous effort, she dragged herself away from the riot of thoughts. Trembling, she brought her hands up, forming her fingers in the Spear. The sign, anathema of the Old Sun, flashed before her in emerald flames. Instantly, the whispers receded, turning into little more than faint echoes. The floor was solid once more. The riot of sensations and feelings disappeared. Even the cold drew back.
Tener gasped and gagged, the Sign turning into a smaller replica smoldering on her chest.
"Are these remnants?", she wondered shakily. "Or it's just echoes of its power?" She had not expected that level of oppression, that suddenness. Even if it was just dregs, to be able to pierce her defenses to such an extent… excitement surged.
After taking a moment to calm down, she assessed her surroundings once more.
She was on a shelf of rock, wide enough to hold an army and leave room to spare. It ended with a ragged border and an abrupt drop. Two massive, ragged tongues of the smooth rock signaled where bridges once traversed the chasm. Thankfully, a third one was still intact, a colossal, reality-defying arch with no load-bearing columns or railings.
Holding down the growing excitement, Tener started for it. Still, she knew better than to trust her eyes in that strange place. With a flick of her will, gusts of wind stirred the stale air. They lifted her up, currents of air twirling and twisting beneath her feet, before speeding her forward.
Even like that, the place was so mind-bogglingly vast that it would take her a few minutes to reach the bridge. Still, she didn't mind. At least, the journey gave her time to wonder at her surroundings.
Even the walls, now that she noticed, were carved and inscribed. Bas-reliefs, smooth and half-faded, covered rugged rock that showed no sign of tools. Teren saw the outlines of massive creatures, engaged in activities she couldn't name, let alone recognize. She saw fins, jaws, pouches, tentacles, claws, scales, many on the same creature. She shivered with delight at the sight. The titans of the ancient past, their likeness entrusted to primeval rock. And now, she was the one laying her eyes on it, the first human to ever do so.
Groups of smaller, humanoid-looking creatures clustered around the titans, bowing, scraping and doing worse things that she didn't care to look at. She looked at them with an amused type of curiosity. A slave race of degenerates? Or her own ancestors? Did it matter? Humanity had come a long way since those times.
The Old Sun made its appearance in more than one place, and she made sure to shield herself with the Spear before looking at it. The glyph was shockingly simple for being so fundamental. A circle, split in half by a vertical line that didn't quite touch the borders that contained it. Seven spikes jutted out from it, curving gently to form a crown of rays. Tener felt a rush of awe. The Old Sun, the beast that Einr smote to make the world.
Wherever the glyph appeared, throngs of monsters and human figures dutifully abased themselves. Still, apart from that, she couldn't see anything else. Most of the carvings with the Sun in them appeared to have been ground away, by whom hands, she couldn't say. A pity, but she wouldn't hang herself over it. Dead things were of no interest to her, even dead gods.
Close by, the bridge was monstrous. A colossal tongue of wet-looking rock, it reached impossibly far, clearing the whole chasm in a single arch. In theory, it seemed impossible for such a bulky thing not to crumble, crushed under its own weight. In practice, it was there, and Tener wasn't one to look a gifted horse in the mouth.
As she zipped across glistening stone, watching the bas-reliefs, the pillars and the great walls, a sense of accomplishment fluttered in her chest.
Nobody handed you anything at the Tenerann. What you had, be it in knowledge, spell and status, you had to snatch and hold with tooth and nail. She should know. Since she had memory, she had to scheme and intrigue, steal and kill. First, to survive, then, to prosper. She sacrificed everything to her climbing of the ranks of the Order, her own name when she took the title of Great Archmage being the most trifle. She stabbed friends in the back, sent innocents to be tortured, blackmailed, spied on, fought, outwitted and killed.
People said she was despicable, the worst soul to ever ascend to the vaunted seat of Great Archmage. Those same people were dead and gone, the luckiest now rotting peacefully in a nice grave under the willow groove beside the academy. The unlucky? Unrecognizable bodies found flopping in the Archant, scorch stains left on the tiles of the Ring, or withered hands floating in a jar of vinegar, waiting to be used as focal objects. She even had one herself. Why, old Reynauld made a wonderful impression on the mantelpiece. It helped that he got over that ugly habit of saying the wrong things at the wrong times.
Victims, weaklings, all of them, crushed to a paste by the ruthless world that was the Tenerann. Not Tener. She understood the rules and what needed to be done to get on top, and stay there. They could call her ruthless and whatever rustic word they wanted. She'd be laughing at their bleeding corpses from behind her shiny mahogany desk, seated on a chair of oak upholstered in blue velvet and sipping a red from Kanta. And all the while, her painting watched sternly whole classrooms of future mages train in the Arts, reports from spies and dignitaries from all Ea cluttered her desk and her name was whispered in hushed tones in any royal court worth a damn. Hers was the realistic way, and the winning side.
And look where it got me. She smiled, enjoying the faint breeze on her face.
When that apprentice whose name she couldn't be bothered to remember brought that note to Lamaxus, and the flustered master brought it to her in turn, she instantly understood that she may have very well brushed with a prize that could put all her previous accomplishments to shame. After having them both discreetly taken care of – floors could be so slippery at night and one could choke so easily on food -, she had immersed herself in the study. That the result was wildly successful had been barely tempered by the realization that she needed help. From her fellows, of course. The Circle of Archmages of Tenerann, previously the most influential body in all of Ea and nest of vipers, now bones littering a floor. She smirked. Oh, fate could be so tragic sometimes.
The amount of support she received for her research was unprecedented, almost for her career. All of the Archmages, agreeing on something. That was a sight she never thought she would get to see in her lifetime. But how could they not?
The withered, shriveled, half-burned book fished from the depths of their ancient library told of a story that was recounted only in fables, all of them wildly different from the original thing. The book, one of the last existing records of the peak of the Einerann Age, told of how the Wild Gods threw down a Thing-Before-Time, an Old Sun, and from its remains, carved the whole world.
Teren still remembered the way the flowers on the table had withered at the mention of the Old Sun's true name, how the light coming from the ample windows seemed to dim. Of how old Aristonis's broke with a bang, sending the old fool sprawling. Funny, if not for the blood pooling in her own ears.
Archmages had a nose for power. Caught the scent, they chased it relentlessly. They studied and pieced together, wove spells and researched. They found the ancient Sign of the Spear, able to ward off the Old Sun's lingering influence. They plumbed the Abyss, that shadowy place from which all magic comes, and found the dark corners where the footprints of the Old Sun could still be found. They learned to harness the power lingering there, to channel it into their own world as a branch of magic never seen before. And it wasn't enough.
A massive amount of time, effort, skill and money, sank into it. Mishaps by the dozens, dimensional breaches and things that had once been humans carried away to study if useful and a swift end if not.
Teren didn't remember a time when she worked so relentlessly, so obsessively. Weeks upon weeks, sustaining herself only on mana infusions. Skipping lunches and dinners, pulling all-nighter after all-nighter, pouring over incantations, experiment reports and writing essays. For the good of the project, of course, but also because all her esteemed colleagues were racing to be the one with the most information, the most results, the most advance, while struggling to steal and keep the others in the dark.
"And I got out on top," she thought with vicious satisfaction.
At last, they found it, the object of their frenzied research. The place where all the murky footprints and vague hints led to. A corner of the Abyss, secluded away behind barriers upon barriers so old, so complex and powerful they couldn't make tails or heads of them. The farthest place, where the flows of magic were dead and still, where even the most powerful spirits dared to tread. The darkest pit, the most forgotten recess. Uduru, the Rift. It was there that they would find the heart of a dead God.
"The heart Einr handed to Borvi so he could hide it away," Teren murmured the phrase, relishing it. It all started from that.
Shards of fingernails the size of a grain of sand, credited to have belonged to that or this Wild God, could give a mage the power to, with a single, earth-shattering spell, tear down a castle, or blow an army to dust. He could reshape the land, raise a siege wall tall and wide enough to halt an invasion, redirects rivers, and move forests. Wars were fought over such artifacts, kingdoms crumbled and rose based on who possessed them.
Now, let us take the Heart of a Dead God. Let us wonder, just for the sake of theory-crafting, what an accomplished magician could manage with such a powerful artifact at her disposal. Raise a fortress overnight? Split a mountain open? Open the sea? Raze nations? Move the stars? Become a God?
Teren's mind ran wild with possibilities, each more delicious than the last. They all did, and all they had, they poured into that single trip. A full-body, full-conscience extraplanar journey to the Abyss, all so that they could seize the Heart and link themselves to it. The notion alone was ludicrous, the Abyss was inimical to mortal life, and the barriers between worlds were unbreakable, those defending the Heart mind-boggling. But they had the means and the will. Through time, blood and sweat, they found the way and, after weeks of preparations, countless mana spent and all the defenses they could think of woven, they pulled the trigger.
That Borvi's work had been phenomenal. Even after who knew how long, the defenses he left were incredible, even if mauled badly by time and neglect. It took all the pooled knowledge and skill of the full Circle of Archmages just to make a pinprick wide enough for them to pass through.
Teren smiled innocently. Very unluckily for her colleagues, her own research had gone a little further. There was one teeny-weeny defense mechanism they missed, and that she didn't. It was oh so painful having to keep that tiny hint to herself, but then again, how do you share only one heart?
She laughed, head thrown back. Amarilli, Aristonis, Gernicus and the others, all of them the most esteemed, oldest, most powerful archmages in all of Ea. She would spare them a fond thought from time to time as a Goddess, sitting at her shiny desk while the kings of Ea beggared for her ear. Sipping from a good Kanta red, of course, because even as Gods, if a thing works, why change it?
She laughed at her own joke, speeding up, the stale air rushing her by. Hers really was the winning side.
The spiritual pressure kept increasing the longer she advanced, until the Spear was subtly shaking on her chest.
Tener took it as a good sign. It showed how powerful the Heart was. Not like she expected any less, not after all the trouble she went through to get there.
The bridge gave way to an even more colossal landing if possible. Tener scoffed lightly. Really, she was starting to wonder if the builders had something to compensate for. If only they used marble, or serena, or anything different from that horrible green rock.
An immense - go figure – entrance led the way out of the cavern. A door the size of the Imperial Palace of Jar-zin stood ajar, while its twin laid in three pieces on the floor. Strangely enough, the back and shattered side of it was covered by fuzzy, white growth, like grass, or algae. It waved softly, Tener noticed, even if there wasn't a hint of a breeze. More unnervingly, the fuzz had formed sticky-looking webs connecting the three pieces. They pulsed and tensed softly, like they were trying to pull them back together.
Gladly taking her eyes away from it, she wondered if she'd recognize it as a door in the first place if it was whole and closed. The front of the surviving door was as craggy and uneven as the walls of the cavern. There was no solution of continuity between door and wall, and, from what she could see, no trace of hinges. It was like some colossal mole dug out of the rock, only to plug the entrance to its lair by pulling the doors against it, sealing itself inside of it.
Tener chuckled, amused by the image. She knew better. The earthquake, the damage. It was the wear and tear of the Abyss against this corner of itself. The shadowy dimension didn't appreciate stability, and this place, as rusted as it was, was a marvelous example of staticity in a plane that was chaos itself. The damage she saw was only to be expected. Why, it was a wonder the place still stood. Luckily for her, of course. Still, it wasn't undeserving of attention. Spellcraft able to control the Abyss to such an extent was marvelous. But they could wait until she had the Heart.
Filing the information away for later, she ordered the wind to carry her forward.
As she moved toward the doors, the true immensity of them found home. They loomed over her like mountains, brooding, silent and old. The visage of the Old Sun stood on their front once. Now, there were only scattered shapes among the pittered, battered surface. For some reason, Tener felt like it was watching her. The Old Sun, complete, that strange line arrayed on her and… she blinked. An eye. It's an eye. She knew that already. She studied the glyph and all the legends around it extensively. Why then that realization feel so striking?
She was still trying to puzzle that out when she realized her gaze wasn't on the door anymore. She wasn't sure what brought her to look down. One moment, she was glaring at the doors, refusing to be intimidated. The next, she was looking down.
The floor was made of slabs of glistening rock, large, far too large for human feet. Green, white and brown alternated each other in shimmering strands. The Old Sun loomed, immense, covering everything. And she was in the center of the glyph. Small, pitifully small, trapped in the circle, the eye arrayed on her. It came on her, closer now, closer, closer still. It yawned wide, showing a maw filled with tumultuous black water. It's not an eye, she thought, panicked. It's a mouth.
The Spear jolted on her chest, and she felt being pulled violently back to her feet. She shook her head, feeling the unpleasant sensation of black water flying off her ears and face. She stopped herself from wiping at it only by sheer force of outraged dignity.
She frowned, looking down. The floor was a field of craters and scorches, unremarkable if not for the half-faded shape of a spike.
"Again with the illusions," she growled. She glared at the doors. "We'll see when I get the Heart!" She exclaimed, furious.
The doors didn't answer. Of course, how could they? That place was dead. It had been since the start of the end of the First Age. Feeling ridiculous, but not wanting to acknowledge it, Teren sank her head in her shoulders and willed the spell to move faster.
There was a shift as she passed through the doors. The temperature lowered sharply, to the point that she could feel it sting her skin even through her layers of magic and cloth. The whispers returned, so many drops of glass dropping and cracking somewhere close by.
Making a point of ignoring them, Tener advanced.
It was a strange world beyond the doors. The corridor was immense and tube-like, its walls arching to form a perfect circle. Titanic pillars held it aloft, or maybe they held it down. Looking up, her breath coming out as a fine mist, Teren saw puddles of water dot what was supposed to be the ceiling, the same dotting what was the floor for her. Cracked tiles and crumbled masonry stood where they fell, no matter the angle, as if the whole corridor was a single, rolled plane that refused to accept the rules of gravity and inclination. A strange tint changed the light there, a color that she wasn't exactly sure what to call. Whatever its name was, it turned the pools of water into shiny pools of darkness. In some places, the water rose to form columns of silently flowing obsidian.
Tener had to do her best to not start gaping like a farmer at a city fair. Magic could accomplish much and, as Great Archmage, there was little of it that she hadn't seen. That… wasn't something she had ever witnessed. The control of space? Her mind whirled with the possible applications of such a power. Nobody, not even an army. could approach her. She could… she could twist even a Grain-empowered spell out of the way, sending it spiraling back to its source. It was… it was…
"Invincibility," she breathed, and had to put a hand over her mouth from actually moaning the word.
Out of habit, her eyes darted left and right, to make sure that nobody caught the slip. But nobody was there. It was only her. Her and that incredible Heart, waiting. Laughing out loud was frowned upon in high society, a sign of poor breeding and lack of self-control. Tener laughed hard and loud, the sound of it bouncing strangely across the warped corridor. She kept it far longer than any rule of good manners afforded, her voice turning awkward from never having used like that. She didn't care. Spite and a liberating feeling kept her going.
Who cared about things like manners? Respect, the need to act accordingly? The necessity to always keep herself, appearance and conduct, under control, lest she loses status, fame, and consideration among her peers? Those things were for the old her, the one that had to actually care what others thought and said. She was beyond that now, beyond the aims of petty men that believed themselves worthy to judge her. Beyond scheming, self-serving colleagues, beyond scraping and politicking and having to lower herself to meet everyone's, anyone, expectations. Beyond humanity itself. Now, she could be herself, what she was always meant to be, what she always strived to become. Beyond reckoning, beyond reproach. Here, at the top of the mountain, Tener was finally free.
Heart hammering, she dashed down the corridor. The weak, wind elemental she summoned to give her flight disappeared, its energy expended. Without even looking, she summoned another.
There was a change in the air, a subtle one for a peasant without magic, but a clarion call for her finely attuned spiritual senses. It was like a pit yawned open before her, wide enough to swallow the world, deep enough to hold the night. Chill wind rushing from fathomless depths, carrying the stink of moldering, nameless things. Tener's breath hitched. She had never met with such a vivid, life-like perception. She could swear that there was a frigid breeze wafting over her skin like breath escaping from a sealed tomb; that if she took but one step, she'd plummet forever into darkness.
If she was an unschooled moron, of course. Any mage worth her salt knew that, once their influence was contained, spiritual impressions were just that, no matter how impressive.
Forget that. What truly mattered was… Power. Like nothing she ever met before. As deep and endless as that pit. And it was close, so close.
Holding herself from mouth-watering, she stepped up her pace again. The ambition was a living thing inside of her, and she wasn't going to hold it back.
The corridor seemed to twist as she advanced, the tube contorting on itself until she felt like she was tracing a spiral path down some madman's dream, lost into infinity.
The Spear trembled, letting out a soft whine. It swiveled left and right from time to time, like a pinwheel cocked by the wind, or a drunk lurching down a flight of stairs. When it happened, the whispers returned with a vengeance, raking at her mind with insubstantial claws, making her feel like her stomach had filled with ground glass and her head with sloshing water. Glimpses of herself wallowing in a pool of blood – so much blood, so much blood, hers, she had to take it back – flitted across her perceptions. She gritted her teeth against it all, recalling the Spear until it was firm once again and her mind was free once more. She wouldn't be stopped. Nothing could, not when she was this close, not after all she had to endure. I didn't endure for one century and a half just to stop now.
She went through the first mana tank, ripped it off her back with a snarl and send it to crash unceremoniously against the floor.
She was through half of the second when it finally ended. Tener wasn't sure how large or small the corridor was by that point. Everything seemed to have shrunk so much that she had to crawl on her hands and knees to keep going, and at the same time, it was as large as when she started. She had the vague sight of passing through a strange portal, a pool of bright, clean water that stood up like a wall at the end of the spiral. Its gentle warmth encompassed her completely as she stepped through it, making her sigh in relief.
Tener blinked, stepping into a new place. The whispers, the pressure, the light, they were all gone.
Slowly, she looked around.
No gargantuan pillars or colossal spaces. No alien, glistening rock and depthless darkness. No whispers, no shadows, no cold.
The room was small, almost cramped. Shelves, dusty and crumbling, covered simple stone walls pitted with moss and damp. Whatever they once held was now a shapeless mass of garbage and dust-wrapped spiderwebs. The air was stuffy and stale, like an archive whose windows had not been opened in years.
Uh. This is… disappointing. Tener wasn't exactly sure what she expected, but this definitely wasn't it. The place looked a bit like the closet where she passed most of her novice years.
A skeleton knelt at the center of an array of signs and circles carved into the floor. No, not a skeleton, Tener corrected herself. The dead's skin was all there, but the passage of time made it grey and almost see-through. Beneath, the muscles had thinned to slices that clung tightly to glistening bones, making it look like the man had been cured while still alive and then dumped there.
He wore armor that must have been beautiful once, silver and gold beaten and decorated with beautiful engravings. Now, the surface was pitted and scarred, the shine dulled by dust and neglect. The beautiful lines – is that a boar? - were blurred and confused, almost as if the whole thing had been on the point of melting more than once. Now, all that remained was a twisted maze of discordant lines and sheets of sad-looking scraps.
Between the now far too-large armor and the mass of cobwebs festooning it, it was a marvel that the skeleton had not crumbled. Instead, it stood there, a kneel down, forehead pushed against gauntlets wrapped tightly around a sword's pommel.
Tener came close to it, fascinated. Our esteemed Borvi maybe? She wondered. Given the amount of effort put to keep her from her prize, it wouldn't be surprising if the God decided to put himself or a servant as a last line of defense. She laughed. If that's how it is, sorry for disappointing you, my friend. Turns out you weren't half as clever as you thought yourself to be. You should have chosen something more long-lived. She patted good-naturedly the skeleton, making the skull scrape against the pommel. Thoughts and prayers for the dead. That's how the saying went, or something. The treasures, for the living, more precisely, for her.
She turned toward the wall the skeleton was guarding.
The door was a reminder of the place they were. As they rounded the corners, the stonewalls gave way without solution of continuity to the wet-looking, green-white rock she had got oh so accustomed with. Channels were carved roughly in the cavern wall. Following it with her gaze, Tener recognized the visage of the Old Sun, the spikes crawling across stone like a spider climbing atop a wall, or looming over a reached bird's nest. A shiver ran through her. Impressive to the end. And soon, it'll be mine.
The slit of the eye made for the point where the doors met. A half-faded glyph covered it, silver and gold paint flowing and overlapping to form a complicated structure that covered the eye, expanded over the circle, reached the spikes. And then, right at the center of it, what unmistakably was a message. Written, no, scrawled, in red, smudged and drooped as if the hand that wrote was trembling. A simple warning, written in the ancient Einerann Old Tongue, one that Tener was very well equipped to translate.
In the name of all the Laws of Gods and Men, of Mercy for all that Lives, for your own soul and mind's sake, to thou who read, I implore: stay away.
Tener read, frowning. She glanced at the skeleton. Was she dreaming it, or something had changed in its posture? Did it matter?
She chuckled. No, it didn't, like that ridiculous warning. The laws of Gods and Men? There was no such thing as the first and she was above the latter. Mercy? A fancy word that fools used to say weakness. And the third, well, how about the dead let her care about it?
You did your best. Tener reached to affectionately pat the skeleton's bowed head. You know, staying here and dying like an idiot for nothing. But don't you worry. I'll make very well sure that the Heart won't go to waste anymore. Why, I am fixing yours or your master's idiocy. You should almost thank me.
The skeleton didn't answer, making her chuckle. The way of the dead, of course. Dust, all of them. Gone and lost. And who was such a fool to let dust's warnings keep them from reaching for the delicious prize? Borvi was more cunning than she thought, keeping that last warning to pick at the superstitious mind to manage what his defenses couldn't. Too bad for him that his opponent was Tener, First Archmage of the Einerann and Goddess-to-be.
Chuckling, she gave a gentle push to the skeleton and turned to walk toward the door.
And stopped.
Tener's gaze snapped down. Where the skeleton's fingers had closed around her wrist. She yelped, ripping her hand out of its grasp. The skeleton turned, lunging at her with outstretched, bony fingers, mouth rattling open, a wheeze coming out of his throat.
In a panic, Tener raised a hand, fire already gathering at her fingertips.
The skeleton slumped with a rattle of bone and armor. The helm fell from its head, clattering and rolling on the ground.
Tener panted, heart hammering in her ears, tongues of fire licking between her fingers.
She lowered her eyes. The skeleton didn't move. His fingers were tangled with the hem of her robe, just shy of reaching her.
It took her two attempts before kicking herself free. She scrambled at her feet, fear giving way to rage.
"Idiot! Stupid!" She didn't even know who she was cursing at but didn't care. Of course! No magic could bring back the dead. Even the Gods, if they had ever existed to begin with, were dust by now, and nothing could bring them back. Necromancy could make puppets out of corpses, but any spell died out as time passed, its energy expended. This stupid corpse simply lost its balance and fell on her. And she got so scared!
Burning with rage and humiliation, she kicked the skeleton. The head came cleanly off, rolling and rattling on the floor until it stopped against the wall. It remained there, empty eyes watching her sadly.
For some reason, it only made her angrier, made her scream and throw her hand out. Light filled the chamber, the air whipping itself into furious currents. The skeleton disappeared in a fountain of flame. The cobwebs took fire, flapping wildly as the shelves crumbled in burning messes. Cracks appeared on the stonewalls, dust flying off with loud pops.
Tener kept the stream of power viciously, before cutting it off with a snarl. The fire disappeared as quickly as it appeared. It left the chamber devastated. Where the skeleton knelt, there was only a scorch mark radiating outward like a hand. Scorched mounds and piles were everything that remained of the shelves. Dust fell from the cracked ceiling. As for the skeleton itself, melted pieces of armor and bone pattered on the floor.
Much more appropriate. Tener flicked a lock of hair off her forehead, huffing with contempt.
Viciousness repaid, she turned toward the door. Pleasingly, the fireball had done the work for her, finishing erasing a good chunk of the half-faded glyph system. "Not so good of a work, mh?" She thought with vicious satisfaction.
Glancing with a smirk where the skeleton's head had been – and where now were only scattered fragments – she strolled toward the portal.
The gates were chillingly cold at the touch, her fingers turning instantly numb as she splayed them against it.
She licked her lip, emotion pulling at her chest. This was it. The source of the power was just beyond. She could feel it, a dark star pulling at her, calling her. And now, it's mine.
She had to keep herself from laughing. Not out of propriety, no. Only because she couldn't wait, not anymore.
She focused her power as she pushed, expecting some last-ditch defense. Instead, the doors just gave way obediently. Without a sound, they swung on invisible hinges.
Beyond, darkness. So thick, so complete, that it was like a black wall barred the way. But it wasn't. It was open. And Tener could almost hear the Heart calling at her, almost like a voice in her head. Close now, so very close. Just a few more steps.
Eager, Tener stepped forward, disappearing into the portal.