Like frost from a long winter finally melting in the spring, life begins to bloom in Fyreneth’s Fortress. Over the next week two groups arrive from the lost colony and begin to make homes within the palace. Suddenly, the vast cavern, previously silent save for the occasional drippings of condensation, is now filled with quiet murmurs of life: footsteps in the halls, chopping and bubbling in the kitchens, the clattering of carts on the streets. By the time all of their people have relocated, our population will have nearly doubled. It’s starting to feel like a real city.
Every one of the newcomers visits me within the first day or two of their arrival. It’s uncomfortable. I’ve never been a socialite, and I certainly don’t like the underlying motivation for why they want to meet me. But I try to be patient and kind and… me. Maybe being me is the only way I can convince them I’m just some engineer with a rudimentary understanding of magic, and not a mythical figure reborn.
“Excuse me.”
I inwardly wince at the hesitant new voice and set down the airfoil I was working on. It’s made of cloudstone, which completely screws up every aerodynamic instinct I have when working with the wing. Fascinating stuff.
“Hello,” I say, turning to the newcomer. I don’t recognize the dwarf standing in the doorway. Another new arrival come to introduce themselves and ask for blessings, no doubt. “Can I help you?”
“Sorry to bother you,” the man says. “I was told I would find Captain Mirzayael here.”
“In my workshop?” I ask, amused. Although calling it a workshop is a bit of a stretch. I’ve adapted a room adjacent to the throne room, possibly originally designed for meetings or banquets, and co-opted it as my own personal laboratory. Right now that only entails various notes on stone compositions, Fyreneth’s throne, spell circles, my incomplete periodic table, and a dozen conceptual drawings of airfoils and flying apparatuses which incorporate the cloudstone—but every scientist needs to start somewhere. “Why would she be in my workshop?”
“Ah, I was told she’s usually where you are,” the dwarf says.
“That’s… not entirely wrong,” I admit. She really does spend a lot of time with me, doesn’t she? “Regardless, she’s off doing guard business today. What was it you needed her for? I could pass on the message.”
“The scouts spotted people out on the ice,” he says, wiping all of my amusement away in an instant.
“People?” I ask. “From your colony?”
He shakes his head. “The last of our people are scheduled to start the migration tomorrow. These were different. The scouts saw them disappear in a flurry of snow, but they were heading in the direction of Jorria.”
I frown. So far as I’ve gathered, there haven’t been any clashes between the two groups in modern times, but even the Fyrethians from the lost colony harbor a deep-seated fear for them.
“Thanks for letting me know,” I say. “Here, just a moment.”
I retreat to my workbench, where I retrieve a small white spider made of silk. It almost looks like a stuffed animal, but it has a rune emblazoned in its back. Mirzayael had left it with me in case I needed to contact her.
“I’m not sure where she is, at the moment, but this should take you to her,” I tell the man, offering out the tracking spider.
“Thank you.” The dwarf accepts the spider with two hands, nodding his head respectfully as he steps back to leave, then hesitates at the threshold as if he wants to say something more.
“Is there anything else?” I prompt.
“Is it true you wield Fyreneth’s crown?” he blurts out. “I’ve heard the others speaking of a magical stone…”
I hold in a sigh and gesture to my head instead. “As you can see, my head is bare.”
“Right,” the dwarf says, deflating a little. “But your name—”
“Was given to me by people who draw unwarranted parallels,” I say. “Please, though, Fyre is the complete name, not short for anything. In fact I’ve heard there are one or two phoenix harpies in your colony as well?”
“There are,” he admits. “Meyir and Galeth. Twins. They’re very wise. We’re lucky to have guidance from such an auspicious pair.”
“Well, I can’t wait to meet them,” I say. Maybe then I’ll have others who can relate to my headache.
“Of course,” he says. “I’ll make sure they’re brought to you as soon as they arrive.”
“That’s really not necessary,” I start, but the man has already bowed and retreated back into the hall. I never even got his name.
I let out a long sigh as I turn back to my workbench. It seems that my days of being able to wander about the Catacombs, exploring new wings and searching for hints of magic, have come to a close. With all the newcomers, Beryl has been hinting that she’d rather have be contribute to the city in a more sociopolitical manner. Would be that I could continue hiding myself away and experimenting on stone and spell circles in isolation. Well, mostly isolated. Mirzayael would be welcome company. But I suppose with great power, and all that…
Another knock comes at the door, and this time I do wince. What is it now?
“Heya!” Dizzi pokes her head in. “Can I steal you for a minute? There’s a spell circuit I found and I want to figure out what it does. I figure my options are either shoot some magic into it and see what happens, or use you to trace it to its source to potentially avoid blowing stuff up.”
“My vote is for option number two,” I say.
“Figured as much.” She sighs. “Old people are predictably boring like that.”
I quirk a smile. “Do you want my help or not?”
“Don’t pretend like you’re not already on board,” Dizzi says. “Come on! It’s down in the crypts.”
I blink. “Crypts?”
----------------------------------------
Despite Dizzi’s dubious naming convention, there are no bodies or graves to be found. Which is frankly a relief, because at this point I’d have no excuse for not having mapped out every inch of the Fortress. With the mana ore readily available, the Dungeon Core is never low on mana, and neither am I. All I have to do is close my eyes and tap into the Map Interface, and I can see the entire buried castle—all of it at once. It’s like the Dungeon Core’s consciousness has expanded to inhabit the city itself. I still can’t see the people in the castle, but everything made of stone shows up, and even some other substances the Core has previously consumed, such as moss and mushrooms. It makes me wonder if any like-object the Core consumes will become visible in our interface. If it ate a person, would I see people? That would be equally useful and disturbing. Not a theory I’m willing to put to the test, at any rate.
“These are storage rooms, Dizzi,” I say as we walk through the network of cold, underground chambers. Though given how they’re so remote from the main part of the castle, and how there’s still so few of us that we’re all localized in the palace, we haven’t made use of this space yet. “Why did you think it was a crypt?”
“Um, because it has a distinctly creepy vibe about it, obviously,” Dizzi says. “Like where else would you put your dead?” She pauses. “No seriously, what do you guys do with your dead? Back home we’d put them out on the ice. The direwolves or ice cats took care of the rest.”
The frivolity with which she says this shakes me. “That sounds so cold.”
Dizzi shrugs. “The world is cold.”
“Sorry,” I say. “I didn’t mean to judge. But, ah, I believe Mirzayael says there’s a grove where they take the bodies. The plantlife consumes them. I’ve not seen it yet myself.”
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“Sounds nice,” Dizzi says. “Not too different from what we do, but more peaceful. There’s a nice symmetry to death sustaining life, don’t you think?”
“I suppose, yes.” In theory I’d agree with her; a body is merely a body, after all. But the bluntness of the conversation has thrown me off my stride. It seems her people might have lived an even harsher life than those of Fyreneth’s Keep.
“So, the spell circle,” I prompt.
“Right!” Dizzi says, perking up. Not that she ever really seems to be un-perked. “It was in the back room over here. Part of the wall is collapsed, which is why I can’t make all of it out. But I’m trying to figure out why it would be down here of all places.”
“Why were you down here of all places?” I ask.
“Don’t be ridiculous, Fyre,” Dizzi says. “I’ve gone in every room of the palace I’ve been allowed access to.”
I raise an eyebrow. “You’re not allowed in some?”
“Ugh, I know, right?” she huffs. “Mirzayael said something about the north-east quadrant of the city being off limits because the terrain was ‘unstable’ and there were ‘deadly wild beasts’ or something. Totally unfair. I could just fly away if I got in trouble! That’s what I’ve always done before.”
“That might be slightly more difficult in a tunnel or small cavern,” I point out.
“Ugh, now you sound like Hetlanir.” Dizzi ducks into a room, hunching her wings down as she passes under a low, slanted doorway. The roof itself is angled down, too. She’s right that there was a collapse of some sort; I’ll need to straighten that out with the Dungeon Core and make sure the structural integrity hasn’t been compromised. I duck in after her, my silhouette briefly casting the room in darkness.
“Aw, crap, I should have brought a light,” Dizzi says.
“Here.” I summon a Spark in my palm.
“Oh! Right. Nifty, that.” Dizzi shuffles back to give me more room, watching the fire with an impressed look. “Keep forgetting your thing is fire instead of air. Must be neat.”
“Rather frustrating, actually,” I say, holding the light up to the wall. Sure enough, there’s a partial spell circle inscribed in the wall, half of it concealed by the tilted ceiling. “I’d much rather have air given the option.”
“Why don’t you learn it, then?” Dizzi asks.
I frown. “What do you mean? I thought I could only learn magic that was within my Affinity.”
“I’m talking about learning a new Affinity,” Dizzi says. “Just because you weren’t born with a certain Affinity doesn’t mean it’s impossible to develop later in life. In fact, in harpy communities it’s pretty common practice to train young phoenix harpies to gain a wind Affinity. But of course, you probably already know all this. Right?”
I glance away. “No. There weren’t any other harpies in Fyreneth’s Keep before you all arrived.”
“Right,” she says flatly. “And before you arrived here?”
I’m fully aware of how weak my backstory must seem. “I wasn’t around harpies then, either.”
“Uh huh.” She raises an eyebrow. “Well here’s some magic 101: there’s technically no limit to the number of Affinities you can have. But gaining new ones is tough. If you don’t have an innate knack for it, you need to learn the hard way. Not all phoenix harpies are able to develop a secondary wind affinity, even after years of trying.”
“But how is it done?” I ask. “What are the mechanics behind it?”
“That’s tough to say,” she admits. “Some people say it’s finding a way for the magic to touch your soul. Sometimes, that’s a catastrophic event. I’ve heard some harpies who have been struck by lightning—and survived—came out the other side with an electric Affinity.”
“Trying to replicate that method sounds…inadvisable.”
Dizzi giggles. “Yeah, I wouldn’t recommend it. But it’s one way your soul can come to ‘know’ the element, I suppose. The more practical way would be through study. Meditation. Trying to gain an understanding of the magic or element on a spiritual level.” She wiggles her fingers at me. “Also not the most concrete method of study.”
“Hm.” I have never particularly been described as a spiritual person. Trying to understand a property of nature on a metaphysical level feels counterintuitive to me. But if such a thing is possible, then there’s no reason not to try. “How effective is this method?”
She shrugs. “It really depends on the individual. I’ve heard it said that it’s easier to gain an Affinity for people who already embody the spirit of the type of arcana they’re trying to learn. You know: passionate individuals might be more prone to learning fire magic, whereas stubborn people might be predisposed to a field of earth magic, and so on. That said, some people can develop an affinity within a few days of dedicated study, whereas it might take years for others. With phoenix harpies, we work with the kids from a young age. That usually helps.”
“Well I’m a little late to the party on that one,” I admit. “And I’m unsure that my personality type aligns with wind. But I have a history of studying the subject. Maybe that will make up for lost ground.”
“Can’t hurt,” Dizzi says. “Try meditation sometime. Somewhere you can feel the wind. I suppose that’s easier on a mountain than down in caves. Just… try to connect with it. See what happens.”
“I’ll give it a try and report back on my findings.”
Dizzi laughs. “I knew I liked you. Now, will you help me with this spell circle, or what?”
“Right.” I step forward, spilling firelight over the markings in the wall. The wind magic experiment will have to wait until later. Still, an intriguing idea.
“This rune, here, refers to earth arcana,” Dizzi says, pointing out the markings. “And this other one is indicative of a direction, I think. But that’s all I can make out from the partial circle.”
“Let me try something,” I say, placing my hand against the wall and mentally nudging the Dungeon Core to get its attention.
You awake?
The Dungeon Core has no idea what I’m talking about.
I was being figurative. I’ve got some rock for you to eat.
This causes it to perk up. I’ve been doing way too much mental exploring of the Fortress as of late and not nearly enough excavation. It’s starving!
This will be a bit more delicate than a typical excavation, I think. See here? I need you to eat the ceiling away a bit without disturbing these markings. All while making sure that won’t collapse the room on top of me. Also, if there appears to be different lines of ore in the rock, it might be more magic circuits, and I want to leave all of those undisturbed.
Rules! So many rules.
I did say it was going to be a delicate operation. I smile at the Core’s sullenness. Come on now, none of that. You’ll just have to eat slowly. Try savoring it, maybe?
Savoring? The Dungeon Core doesn’t recognize this concept either.
I send a mental impression of what I mean. Eat slowly, and enjoy it. Come on, give it a try and let’s see if you learn something new.
The Dungeon Core doesn’t need much prompting to start eating away at the rock. I remind it to be mindful of causing a cave in, but the warning wasn’t necessary. Slowly, bits of stone vanish away, nibbled off by an invisible mouse as the stone on my wrist glows with ruby light. Dizzi watches with rapt attention, saying nothing as bits of the spell circle are revealed. While the Core works, I close my eyes and mentally plunge into the Map Interface, borrowing the Core’s sense to locate the spell circle in the wall and push my consciousness into the stone, feeling out the composition of its surroundings. Sure enough, there’s a vein of rock connected to the spell circle, distinct from the rest of the wall. I push my mind along that path and follow it deeper into the earth.
“Ah,” Dizzi says. Despite standing right next to me, her voice seems distant. “I think I’m starting to see. It has to do with moving the stone. But that’s just a piece of it…”
I trace the path to another spell circle buried in another underground chamber. This one is truly sealed off from the outside world, its spell circle completely buried by rubble. But the spell circuit doesn’t stop there. It splits off again to another spell circle, and that leads to another. I follow the daisy-chain of spells through the earth in an enormous loop which encircles the entire Fortress.
“It’s meant to move the city,” I say. Or, I try to say it. For a disorienting moment, I can no longer feel my body. I have no mouth. No ears or eyes. Everything I experience is through the Dungeon Core’s interface. Claustrophobia abruptly crushes around me, and I reel, throwing my mind back toward my body.
“...yre? Fyre? Hey! Hello? You okay?”
I gasp in a deep breath, eyes fluttering open, and catch myself against the wall before I fall.
“Woah!” Dizzi grabs my arm about five seconds after it might have helped. “What happened? You got quiet. Real quiet. I wasn’t even sure if you were breathing.”
“I… maybe wasn’t,” I admit. “How long was I like that?”
“Not sure,” Dizzi admits. “Thirty seconds to a minute, maybe. Not to sound like a mirror bird, but what happened?”
What indeed? That’s the third time this has happened now. I need to be more careful about how I utilize the Dungeon Core. What happens if I can’t reconnect with my body after one such instance? Or what if I leave it for too long?
“I disassociated, I think,” I say. “It happens when I dive too deep into the Core’s senses.”
“Core? You mean Fyreneth’s crown?” Dizzi pointedly asks.
I grimace. “That has yet to be proven.”
“Whatever you say.” Dizzi frowns, but it’s with concern rather than skepticism. “You sure you’re alright?”
“Yes.” I straighten myself up. “However, I don’t think I will be trying that again for some time.”
“No shit,” Dizzi snorts. “You know, maybe you are the type to get struck by lightning to try to get an electric Affinity after all.”
I weakly smile. “I’ll strive to not give that impression from now on. Besides, I think I gathered all the information I could through that method, anyway.”
“Oh?” Dizzi glances at the spell circle, now fully unearthed. “What did you find?”
“There’s a dozen other spell circles connected to this one,” I tell her. “They create a giant circle that encompasses the entire city. And they’re not the only circles set up that way: there’s a series of them, each linked to one another, creating a sort of… massive, underground, magical palisade.”
“Incredible.” Dizzi runs her hand over the spell circle. “And unless I’m wrong, this spell circle is designed to move an enormous amount of stone. What were the other spell circles for?”
I shake my head. “I couldn’t tell from the Core’s interface. And even if I could see them, the markings wouldn’t have meant anything to me. However, the way they were all joined created the pattern of a net, sort of. One which spanned the entire base of the city.”
“Almost as if it cupped the city?” Dizzi asks. “As if it were designed to move the entire Fortress?”
The implications are groundbreaking—literally, perhaps. “You don’t think this spell network is how the city came to be sunk beneath the ground in the first place?”
“It would be a series of extraordinary circumstances for that not to be the case,” Dizzi says. “However, I’m even more interested in what the reverse implications might be. If this spell circle could be reactivated…”
A chill runs down my back. “Then Fyreneth’s Fortress could be raised again.”