36. Underground

“Though I rarely speak of those years, there was once a time when I was condemned to a life in the mines of Timilir. I remember the boy of those days, how he had ventured out in so brave and fearless a fashion. Then I see my own reflection, the damage dealt by a weak hunger and a strong thirst, and I wonder where that boy has gone.

Would he sit idly by, sending expedition after expedition only to have no news? Or would he charge blindly forward into the unknown and discover that which he is looking for?

I tell myself that I stay only for Hjorvarth’s sake. I know what it is to live as an orphan, and if I get lost in the snow he will have no mother or father to guide him. Perhaps my true fear is that he will be better off without me.”

Hjorvarth walked with rope around his waist, tied tight, looped around the Sage, and again onto Engli. He could not see, but he could feel the cold walls brush his shoulders, and had to stoop because of the low roof. He walked slow, so that he didn’t overstep into some hole or chasm. He had to keep his shield ever ready ahead of him, as well, so a creature didn’t leap out from the blackness and skewer him through the heart, which he thought an odd warning given the Sage’s assurance that they were alone. That hadn’t stopped the hissing though, or the clacking, or what sounded like a distant beat of wings.

They had heard songs and screeching, mad noises washing over them as they crossed from one black place to the other, from stonework corridors and structures to uneven tunnels until they reached a cavern that offered echoes which spoke to lofty height and endless width.

Hjorvarth paused at a rocky ledge, scuffed stones falling in silence until they landed with a distant rattle as if a league below.

“Are we standing next to a bloody great chasm?” Engli asked.

The Salt Sage chuckled. “That’s why we have the rope, Engli.”

Hjorvarth began pressing his feet around him, in search of a continuation of the rocky bridge they had followed.

A cacophony of unearthly noises began above, around, and below them, as if hundreds of predators had been wakened by the conversation.

“There is no way forward,” Hjorvarth’s deep voice cut through the growing din. “Unless you mean for us jump.” He smiled in disgust, scowling into the darkness now hidden creatures began to growl and screech. Each man had to hold his footing against drafts of air. The ground beneath them shook as great-weighted creatures clambered across the cavern walls. “Say your prayers, Engli,” Hjorvarth suggested. “To no man’s surprise, the Sage has led us to our death.”

Engli closed his eyes, whispering. He prayed for his parents, for Sybille, and for Horvorr.

“Check again,” the Sage shouted. “I am sure it carries on!”

He snapped his fingers: golden luminescence erupted into the cavern, revealing walls crawled or perched upon by hundreds of creatures ranging in size from a hand to a house.

Hjorvarth saw much before the light faded, but discounted the sights as tricks of his mind, unable to reconcile the monstrous variety of life on momentary show.

Despite his disbelief, he hurled his axe into the darkness, where he had seen a winged beast poised to strike at Engli. Metal ripped into flesh. A hateful wailing shook the air around them.

Engli’s blood froze, but opening his eyes to the darkness did little to avail his fears.

“It really does end!” the Salt Sage shouted in genuine astonishment.

Engli held his shield to his chest, which was then struck. He was forced back from the ledge and into the chasm.

“We should—” The Salt Sage began, ripped away by the weight.

Hjorvarth was dragged forward, but he kept his footing. He couldn’t hold the weight of both men swinging below for long. He gripped his knife, brought it to the rope, but had no heart to cut Engli loose.

Stone cracked underfoot. The precarious path collapsed.

***

Hjorvarth smashed into icy water, desperate and senseless while the cold pressed in on his lungs. He thought that he had died, gone to the Lady’s Shadow, where he would forever relive his struggle in the lake with Brolli.

Hard ground pressed against his heels and his sloshing arms thumped into a wet robe.

“Swim!” came the Sage’s garbled advice.

Hjorvarth’s boot brushed into a fallen man. He reached down despite his failing breath, hauling the body with him now he struggled up. A gloved hand gripped him by the collar, pulling until he broke into the open air above.

The Salt Sage and Hjorvarth pushed Engli out of a stone-walled pool and onto the paved ground below.

Hjorvarth frowned in confusion and tried to rub the icy water from his aching face.

He had sight of a neatly-walled city of stone, which reminded him of Timilir. It had been built within an enormous cavern, the approach illuminated by hanging brass-made lanterns and standing silver-wrought torches.

“I don’t,” he began, pausing at how close the place had come to silence. He clambered out of the fountain and water splashed onto the paved road.

The Salt Sage lay over Engli, switching between pushing his chest and, by all accounts, kissing the man.

“Sage?” Hjorvarth asked, his tone disconcerted. “What—”

Engli choked, shuddered, and spluttered. He tried to breathe, gagged, and rolled over with help of the Sage.

Hjorvarth watched with a mix of confusion and relief as the blond man retched water. “Sage,” he repeated more forcefully. “I want answers.”

The Salt Sage pushed up to his feet, brushed off his wet robes, and paced as if to stretch his legs. “To what?”

“We are not where we were.”

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“Yes… we fell.”

“We fell into the largest chasm I have ever seen,” Hjorvarth countered, “and landed in a pool of water little deeper than I am tall.”

“When you put it that way, I’m as confused as you are.” The Sage upturned his gloved palms. “Perhaps we did fall into a chasm… and then we landed on a slope, which ferried us down to the safety of this… place.” He swept a hand out to encompass the torch-lit city of stone. “Your guess is as good as mine. Do you have a guess?”

Hjorvarth stood in silence, his stony face edged by red light. “Who are you?”

“Who am I?” The Salt Sage laughed in good humour, bending on one knee to slap the recovering blond man on his back. “Who are you?”

“I am the son of a loving mother who died young,” Hjorvarth answered in all severity. “Of a disgraced hero, who I knew more as a man that favored his own drinking above the happiness of his son or wife; who risked all and lost all, but survived all the same. I am at times, like my father once was, an angry and petulant bastard of a man. At others, as my mother was, quiet and thoughtful. But what I am, above all else, is a man who has no love of liars. So tell me who you are, Sage, and what you are about, or I will break your neck and have an end to this.”

The Salt Sage murmured as if in deliberation. “I am a servant of the gods.”

“Which?” Hjorvarth asked. “The Helmsman or a heathen deity? There is nothing godly about you, Sage. You say no prayers, you do not reflect. You walk and talk and act with little concern for anyone. As if to worship Tomlok is to rely on haphazard foresight and make decisions without thinking. And I have never heard of any Salt Sage who could click his fingers for a source of a light or to move us from one place to the other, as you did in the forest, and as you did just then.”

“I serve all the gods, save for Death.” The Salt Sage let out a slow sigh. “As to who I am, would you have me mimic your own answer? My mother died giving birth to me and my father was a gambler. A very bad one. I had some talent for making bets though, which began to even out his losses. I suppose he was glad of my talent… and also jealous, because despite all the wealth I had made him, he felt compelled to bet on his own instincts, which ran contrary to my own. That was the debt and death of him, the orphaning of me… and, I suppose, the beginning of my life. Now would you have me go on, or can we be on our way?”

“To where?” Hjorvarth asked as accusation. “Is the Hall of Hrothgar buried beneath our feet? Or is it in that settlement of stone?”

“This city is simply another way through, as was the path I meant to take before I found it broken.”

“And how is it you have a place as dark and twisting as this so well mapped?”

“I suppose the answer,” the Sage said lightly, “given our predicament, would be that I don’t.”

“No?” Engli asked, his voice hoarse. He struggled up from the floor. “You’ve led us for days, Sage. To the place with the rope. To a stream of clean drinking water in absolute darkness. You even gathered food. So either you know this place better than I know my own home, or you’re doing things that no ordinary man should be able to do. Which makes me want nothing more than to echo the question of who you are.”

“Well—” The Salt Sage stretched his arms behind his back. “Since you’ve so caught me, I suppose I might as well own up to being Joyto the Trickster.”

“So says the robed man,” Hjorvarth growled. “So says the servant of Tomlok. So says the servant of Mubarrak. So says the man who has no name. Who has magic and sees things before they happen… though never enough to have us go happily on our way.” He shook his head. “You are either a very clever man, Sage, or the world’s luckiest fool. Who, or what, guides you? Why this path? Why Jorund’s Hill? And what is it you are of a mind to find?”

“I follow the path that the gods set for me. As I always have, as I always will. As to this path, I didn’t want to use it. Despite what happened, the other way was safer. Jorund’s Hill houses the only sound tunnel into this place, and I’m of a mind to find… a hall. And as I have often said, I’ve come to save Horvorr, and I’ll be sorely disappointed with any outcome other than that.”

Engli shook out his sodden clothes. “If you had no mind to come here, how would you even know the way?”

Hjorvarth scowled at the silent city. “And in what way is this place not safe?”

“At a guess?” The Salt Sage upturned his gloved palms. “A war was fought here some years ago. Not an honest one, more of an effort at collapsing tunnels that served to channel air. He laughed a sad laugh, and ambled towards the torchlight. “A quiet night was that, of soundless sleeping.”

***

The paved road led to three curved archways, where the gates lay open to darkness. Each structure of stone rising above the wall appeared close to untouched, banded with gleaming metals for adornment, wrought with narrow windows that allowed a view of the three disparate companions as they approached.

The Salt Sage paused at the main gate, which had been plated with gold, etched with a scene of combat between tall goblins and small men. “First rule of a haunting,” he mentioned to the men at either side of him. “Don’t get separated. Once you’re on your own, you’re on your own.”

Hjorvarth and Engli shared irritated glances and followed the robed man into the silent city.

“Do you really think that this talk of spirits—” Hjorvarth found himself abandoned on the shadowed road. “Engli…?” He had the cavern wall at his left and a row of stone homes on his right. Two tall torches burned at either side of the gate behind him, which was now barred by a banded door. “Engli?” he yelled, his voice echoing back at him.

“Hjorvarth?” asked a distant shout. “Where are you both?”

“I may have gravely misjudged our situation!” the Salt Sage’s melodic voice sounded at a distance between both men. “Keep forward! And remember that this is all a matter of—” A shrill scream pierced through the darkness. “Perception! There appear to be creatures here, as well! So some of it is more a matter of physicality! Try not to die, is—”

An explosion rocked the air, shaking the foundations of the city. Stone cracked and collapsed with a slow groan and an upward plume of chalky dust.

“Stay where you are, Engli!” Hjorvarth reasoned that each man had arrived at one of the three entryways, but he needed to understand his surroundings, so he strode towards one of the sturdy homes. He used all his weight to try and kick the stone door open. And bounced back onto the hard ground.

Hjorvarth groaned, struggling back to his feet. He had done little more than mark the stone with a muddy boot print. He ran over to the gate, trying to pull a torch from the ground, but gave up after it proved no less resilient than the door.

He readied his knife and shield, then marched forward into the darkness.

***

Engli gripped a silver torch near the banded gate; mechanisms clicked, then the tall shaft lifted free. He thanked Joyto for the luck, and made his way to the stone home on his left. He hoped to look out the window to search for his companions, but could see no handle on the metal-adorned door. He pressed one palm into the stone and it swept soundlessly inward. He strode towards the stairs, stumbling at the sight of four desiccated corpses, each seated at a low stone table.

Engli reached for his axe, holding his breath despite the lack of a smell. He searched each of the downstairs rooms, but found only bare furnishings, gleaming adornments, and metal plates etched with scenes of family or battle.

He wished that Hjorvarth were with him, or even the Sage, or Linden. He struggled to think of any others that might be happy to help him. Grettir, perhaps, and Sybille, but the fact that he only had one man his age willing to support him gnawed at his heart and pride. He thought it yet another mark of him being a poor man, though he was in some ways proud of himself, to have ventured out here, to be exploring this mysterious place as any true hero might.

He crept up the stairs, trying not to look at the dead family, shivering all the same. He could only hope he would live to return to his own home and they would all be living and happy to see him.

Engli stepped into a low bedroom that seemed suited for two short folk. There were no shutters, only clear glass that reflected the blurry flame of a silver torch. He set that aside, then peered out the window. He had view of a wide street below and what might have been the main archway, though now it was a pile of crumbled stone, warped metal and shattered wood.

A triangular plaza began where the street forked, and ended at the columned entryway of a towering building. It had been adorned with many monuments, of men and weapons, made of metal, minerals or stone; stalls were arrayed in two neat rows; and it housed the foundations of a robust cannon which faced the gate as if in defense of the place.

Engli saw neither of his companions amongst the shadowed plaza. He worried that he was being watched from the row of homes opposite, but each time he checked he found only the mirrored luminescence of his own window.

Engli felt glad of that, despite the chill crawling up his back.