Delver Magic I: Sanctum's Breach by Jeff Inlo (read novels website .TXT) 📕

“Then you should have told us that before we started,” Holli responded with great self control. She spoke the words as advice and not as a reprimand. “As an elf guard, I react differently than others. If you prepare me for such things, I will act less defensively.”

Tun shrugged. The elf’s reaction was not his problem. “Stand where you are and don’t move.” He turned back and waited for the last few to cross.

Holli acknowledged the order. She took no steps, but she immediately scanned the area which was now more or less visible to her. It was as the dwarf warned, the stairs were gone, covered by the same void which previously hid the ground they now stood upon.

Her darting eyes passed over the rough rock walls, and the level smooth floor. Total darkness loomed overhead. A long corridor trailed off to her right while a wide open expanse waited to her left. In the open space, she counted five spiked pits. She wondered how many were real and how many were illusion. The corridor showed no sign of danger, but the way was narrow and left no option for making any turn for as far as she could see. In front of her, a path broke between two pits of still liquid. She smelled the hint of sulfur in the air and guessed both were comprised of acid and not mountain water. She could not see the conclusion of the path, for another veil of darkness blanketed it less than four steps away.

Her surveillance was cut short by Tun’s unbending orders. Jon had crossed through the veil. The younger prince remained the last, waiting patiently behind Lief as Tun walked carefully by the rest to retake the lead. At present, they stood snaked about in apparent haphazard confusion. He addressed them showing little patience.

“Do not stray from this line. I have set you in this pattern because even now hazards wait all about you. You must step exactly where the one in front of you steps, even if it seems a waste of time. If I take twenty steps to circle around a single stone, the rest of you must do the same. Ignore what you see other than what the person in front of you does. Follow the path exactly.”

He looked at Stephen who stood second in line. “Step as I step, move as I move. You will mirror my actions as the sorceress will mirror yours, and so on through the line.”

“I understand,” the interpreter attempted to speak confidently, but his response was hollow and filled with dread.

Perhaps Tun now felt the tier of the dwarves was lacking in true challenge, but others did not. It unnerved the interpreter to be in a place where a single mistake, the merest slip, would mean agonizing death. What would it be like to fall into a pool of acid? To die slowly, painfully as his skin foamed away to nothing? How much better would it feel to die by falling upon sharp, thick spikes? How many would pierce his body if he fell into such a thing? The power of the darkness which previously blocked their sight of this place added to his growing anxiety. If gems could bend the light to their will in such a way, they could hide anything. His life was now solely dependent upon following Tun, as were the lives of the others dependant upon him. If he erred, chances were those behind him would only follow his mistake. The charge weighed upon him like a cloak of lead. As Tun made his first step, Stephen wished anyone else would have been second in that march.

Tun chose the long corridor. He started without further word, and he moved far too quickly for the interpreter’s liking. He marched as if moving through his own home in the tunnels of Dunop. He gave not the slightest indication of watching what was behind him. He had given his order and he expected all to follow. He would not stand over them and guide them like children through the night.

From the rear, Jon was more observant of the movements of the others. He made sure no one swayed from the original twisting path set by his brother, and he made sure they mirrored Tun’s current movements as well.

Tun took five steps down the corridor before turning to his left. It appeared he faced a solid stone wall, but the illusion was revealed as he stepped through it. One by one, the others followed the apparently impossible maneuver of walking through stone, and one by one, they disappeared from the corridor.

Upon clearing the illusion of the wall, the party broke through to a clearing, an area which looked much like the expanse which appeared previously. In fact, to Holli it appeared as the same space. She noted the five spiked pits which appeared in the exact positions as the first she surveyed. She swerved her head about to gain a better perspective of where they had moved.

The wall of the corridor was not directly behind them. Instead, the corridor itself reappeared, just as the path between the two acid pools. They had made no progress. They were back at the starting point, though now facing the open expanse.

“Please watch yourself, Holli,” Jon called out politely from behind.

She was about to reveal what had happened when a stern rebuke came from the head of the line.

“Ignore what you think you see,” Tun commanded with a tone which revealed he did not like to repeat himself.

Exasperated, Holli turned her attention back to the algor that walked before her. Of all that marched, she would have the most difficulty in fending off the illusions. She shuddered each time it appeared as if they were stepping into pits of acid, lava, or spikes. It was difficult for her to believe the feel of her own feet even as they landed upon solid ground and she could only look down to see waiting death.

With all her might, she concentrated upon the steps of the algor, but she could not refrain from scanning the area for threats. Each time she surveyed the surroundings, her tension grew with leaps and bounds. They walked directly over the most blatant dangers, even as safe ground waited within a single step’s distance. She wished to cry out at the idiocy of such movements, yet these same movements defied the very dangers that made themselves so evident.

While not with the same degree of suffering, Ryson also found the march disquieting. Though it was not his training to uncover threats before they manifested themselves, he was a delver. He relied on all his senses to explore a variety of places and things. He had traveled in caves previously, crawled through tunnels which threatened collapse or leapt over gorges with no visible bottom. In these times of exploration, all of his senses guided him away from danger. It now was his task to ignore his own honed sense of vision, or at the very least, to change his perception of what he saw.

A desire filled him to uncover the secrets behind the illusions. He began to focus upon guessing what was real and what was deception before they moved upon it. With his keen eyesight, he sought the gems which created the magic of these mirages. He struggled to perceive that which might reveal the presence of illusion by seeing beyond the actual mirage and sensing the unnatural bend of light. At times, he was actually successful. He attuned his sight to the slightest wavering of an apparent solid structure, or the blur of distortion in visible open space. Several times he would predict correctly when Tun would move away from apparent safety, walk through a solid wall, or step toward an illusion of waiting catastrophe.

These desires, however, split his concentration. He was torn between watching the steps of Lauren and searching for hidden answers to the illusions. He knew such distractions were dangerous, but as Holli scanned for threats which were invisible to her, his instincts kept him searching for answers.

The march proceeded through many corridors, past two curtains of darkness, over and around hundreds of pitfalls, all without a single incident. Tun managed each turn with unfailing memory. Countless times, they walked uncomfortably close to waiting death, but death was always avoided. The cliff behemoth’s size brought him within a cat’s whisker of destruction on many occasion, but he walked as calmly and as confidently as Tun, as if he knew Godson was guiding his every step.

After throngs of twists and turns, after a period of travel where time now had little meaning to any of them, they reached the center of yet another long corridor. Tun stopped, as if to step through yet another wall. He did not, however, move beyond his present position. Instead, he turned to face those that had unfailingly followed his every move.

“We have successfully crossed the first tier,” he stated without emotion. No hint of sadness, relief or joy existed in his expression or voice. He looked over them all with a stone cold glance. He saw the confusion in their faces which merely served to irritate him. “I told you you would not be able to see it. The door to the next level is here.” He pointed to ordinary looking ground. There was nothing which indicated a door of any kind. Shaking his head and muttering, he bent down as if to prove its existence by opening the invisible passage.

As he reached, Stephen realized what he was about to do and bid him to wait.