Melissa, Hanon and Luthel went inside the gate. Behind them, the large doors closed with a click, but Mel didn’t have the capacity to worry about being able to open them again. She looked out on the cobblestoned street before her and dragged in a deep breath.
Around them were buildings lining the street leading east. They walked in silence along the dead city, and every once in a while they’d stop to take something in. A piece of great architecture, a dark alleyway that could perhaps hide a shadow or an ornamental carving.
Mel didn’t know what the symbols meant, but there were all kinds of carvings on the doors here. She spotted a horse, a lemur and a pine tree on just the buildings she passed walking down the main road. They’d been moving toward the east to the highest point in the city. It stretched far above the city with a massive tower and a golden spire on the top.
She didn’t know where the information she needed might be hidden in this city, but both Luthel and Hanon seemed as determined as she was to make it over to that tower. Mel felt drawn to it somehow and even if she wasn’t, this place was too big to look in all the houses and down all the streets. It seemed better to just go straight for the high-profile building.
The tower was located on top of a larger building that had white stairs connected to it. They ascended the stairs quickly. Mel felt eager to get inside, to get this over with. There was something in this city that felt wrong to her, and she didn’t want to stick around to find out what it was.
The larger building had a checkered floor that looked like polished marble and a reception area where no one was working anymore. It was quiet and dusty inside, making Mel remember the ruins of Bahlan and how she’d found Ben Ramsen’s body lying on the floor down there. She hoped the eerie silence didn’t forebode something similar and wished there were no dead bodies left in the city.
“Do you know what happened to the people of Krazaa?” Mel asked.
Luthel turned at the sound of her voice, seeming startled at first. “When the void took over the wastes and spread its darkness through the land, the people of Krazaa disappeared. No one knows where they went, but many assume they became the people of the wastes.”
“So, you are descendants of this place, then?”
Luthel shook his head. “No, even though people seem to believe as much. We descend from the other great cities. Not Krazaa. This place was full of dragons and even though the dragons fought alongside the void at one point. They weren’t friendly most of the time.”
“The dragons were never on your side. They fought to protect the valley at the battle of Cairn.”
“That’s true. But they didn’t just fight to protect the valley. There were dragons on our side, too. The dragons of Krazaa.” Luthel grumbled to himself before adding, “Not that we wanted them there.”
Mel swallowed, taking a few steps up some stairs leading to a top floor. “I don’t think the dragon cult would approve of you saying that.”
Luthel huffed out a breath. “I don’t think the people in the valley approve of me even existing. So I tend not to worry much about what they think.”
Mel guessed that was true and continued walking down a corridor. It led to a small narrow section that she guessed could be the entrance to the tower. But then she found herself standing in a round room with no windows or doors. It was just a dead end and Mel wondered if this was the entire tower and if the rest was just for show.
Hanon joined her, quiet as ever, looking around the strange room. There was nothing here, only gray walls built from stone and a strange symbol carved into the metal floor. That was strange. Why would the floor be made out of some sort of golden metal?
Mel’s eyes connected with Hanon’s just as Luthel strode into the room with them. He took a long glance around the room and then his eyes trailed down to the floor.
“Perhaps it’s the same as the gate?” Luthel said.
Mel’s eyes widened, even though she’d thought the exact same thing just seconds ago. She didn’t want to use more of her powers. She still didn’t feel like they were a gift. More part of the taint that filled her veins and connected her to the void. She wanted to get rid of them.
“Come on now,” Luthel said. “Don’t just stand there staring at each other. We won’t know what secrets this symbol is hiding if you don’t try to open it.”
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Mel sucked in a deep breath through clenched teeth and sighed it in an exhale. “Fine.”
Her need to know and find out a way to fix herself and to help Aldrion overshadowed her reluctance to use her own magic. She closed her eyes and focused on the sound coming from right below her heart. It mingled with her heartbeat and was still hard to nail down. This time she wasn’t angry like she’d been outside the gate.
This time, she was more frustrated and annoyed than anything else. But she heard the sound and played the water note in her mind, focusing on the direction her energy flowed. Eventually, it gave way and water magic sloshed around in her center.
Mel placed her hand next to the symbol, letting the water inside her veins fill the metal at the same time as Hanon filled it with fire. The dragonfly glowed in a bright purple color and steam rose all around the circled disk.
Underneath her feet, the floor suddenly started to move. Hot air puffed up in a rhythm around the floating disk and it moved them up toward the top of the tower. The round room made sense to Mel now as she slumped against Hanon, feeling drained and longing to sit down.
When the disk stopped and slotted into the floor at the top of the tower, Mel released Hanon’s shoulder and stood on her own two feet. She took a hesitant step off from the platform and moved into another circular room. But this was different from downstairs. It was bigger and more open, with windows lining almost every part of the wall. There were furnishings in here and plenty of books covering the shelves of bookcases.
Mel walked up to one of the windows and looked out on the city, seeing all the way beyond the gate into the wasteland. The smog made it harder to see past the path they’d walked to get to the city, but it was still quite a distance. This must have been a great watchtower, so why was it furnished like it was someone’s office?
She turned around, walking up to a large wooden desk with books strewn across the surface. Like someone was just out for lunch but would be back very soon. She thought the people of Krazaa must have left in a hurry to forget to bring all these important papers with them. She grabbed one of the books, throwing it open at a random page.
There was a diagram depicting some sort of sun calendar. It had all the different phases of the moon drawn in a neat line to the side and under there was a handwritten note in black ink, ‘Can the void draw its powers from the moon?’
Mel frowned, looking down at the strange book and feeling like she was slightly out of place here. She wanted information about the void and especially how to kill it, but this was just weird. Why would the people of Krazaa and the dragons who lived here not know who and what the void was? Hadn’t they fought alongside the void in the end, like Luthel had said?
Mel knew he said the dragons weren't friendly with the void most of the time and that the people of Krazaa had disappeared, not joined the void worshipers. But some part of her had still really believed they were the people of the wastes. That everyone who’d once lived in the wasteland had been evil.
“Come, look at this,” Luthel said.
He was waving at her and Hanon, who stood looking out one of the windows. Mel made her way over to what looked like a sundial that was facing west. Luthel was pointing to some carvings at the sides of it. Mel had to crouch down to see the small figures painted on the dial.
There were pictures wrapping around it of people. There was a moon cycle drawn above and some stars lined the top half. But when she traced the pictures to the back of it, she saw dragons flying through the sky, with the sun glistening above them and throwing rays along their scaly skin.
“Wait, there is more,” Luthel said, walking around to the other side.
Mel followed him with Hanon close after her. The last side depicted people snapping their jaws open and breathing out fire from their mouths. Mel immediately took a step back and her eyes drifted over to Hanon to gauge his reaction. It was what he’d done out in the wasteland to save her from the shadows.
His back became rigid and Mel watched as Hanon’s gaze flickered to his father. His mouth drawn into a tight line and his face waiting for what Luthel would have to say.
“Maybe this means they have information about the void’s chosen ones,” Luthel said. “Maybe this means we can change your stars.”
Mel looked back at the depiction, searching for stars above the people breathing fire. But up there was nothing but a thick layer of haze and the sun fighting to pierce the clouds. Mel’s eyes connected with Hanon’s and he gave her a hesitant smile. She could see it was forced but didn’t know if it was meant for her or Luthel.
She took a step back, letting them have a moment for themselves, and walked around the office. Mel could read all the books in the bookcases and probably learn a lot about the people of Krazaa and the dragons. But it would take weeks, if not months, to comb through them all. She could read only the ones on the desk, hoping these were the most relevant ones, but that would take days.
She huffed out an exasperated breath, leaning against the hard surface and feeling like she didn’t know how to best approach this place. It was clear that the city held secrets from the little that they’d found already. But how could she find the most important information first without wasting the precious time they had?
Mel stared out into the empty space, listening to Hanon and Luthel speaking in hushed voices about stars and destinies. Her eyes landed on a piece of the wall that was completely stripped from any books and cocked her head when she saw a symbol of a dragon carved into the stone. But not just any dragon, the exact same one that she’d found at the ruins of Bahlan. The one that hid the stairs leading down into the old forge.
She took a few steps forward and pressed her palm against the symbol, and it gave way. The stone slid back and then to the side, revealing stairs leading down into the darkness. Mel dragged in a deep breath, feeling the sweet sticky smell of death, and her stomach churned.