“That will not do you much good inside.” Elena said as Alarion hefted the Duke’s oversized mace.

“Will it hurt?” he asked.

“Probably not,” she admitted.

“Then I will bring it.” The young man’s eyes trailed off to the nearby cave entrance, followed by a frown. “Assuming I can get it through.”

Fortunately the cave passages proved wide enough, even at their slimmest, for Alarion to pull the mace along behind them as they went. With a bit of wiggling through some awkward angles, it took only a few minutes before student and teacher once more stood in front of the dungeon entrance.

“Do I just walk in?” Alarion asked, fingers hovering just over the silver inlay of the door’s exterior.

“Correct. You have three weeks of rations, but please do not overstay your welcome unless you are on the cusp of completing a challenge.” Elena’s expression was mixed. There was pride, uncertainty and above all concern. “Do not make rash choices. Listen to the guide, and make certain you ask questions when you can.”

“You cannot offer any more specific advice?”

Elena shook her head. “The challenge is different for everyone. My experience will be different than yours. It would not help and might actively lead you astray.”

“Mm,” the boy grunted. Then he reached for the two rings of dark metal and gave the doors a pull. They parted so easily it was if they wanted to be opened. As if they were inviting him in. A blinding white light filled the chamber and Alarion squinted against it, trying to make out something in that void. To no avail.

He looked back at Elena, who nodded and gestured him forward. Alarion took two steps forward and was suddenly… elsewhere.

Alarion found himself in a large, well appointed study. The air smelled of old books, of almond and vanilla, of burnt candles and well aged leather. Floor to ceiling bookshelves covered almost every inch of wall space, save for the crackling stone fireplace and a trio of doors on the far end of the room. Two comfortable looking chairs were set before an enormous oak desk, upon which sat the room’s only other occupant.

She was an older woman, at least twice his age if Alarion had to guess, and beautiful beyond measure. Her hair was white as his own, her eyes golden as the wreath she wore atop her intricate curls and the necklass that hung down between her curves. Her outfit was regal, but not particularly chaste, flaunting pale skin either out in the open or beneath intricate lace of black and gold. She was petite, shorter than him were she standing, but sitting cross legged on the edge of that four foot tall desk she managed to tower over him, looking down in a way that provoked authority from her and irritation from him in nearly equal measure.

She’d noticed him the same moment he noticed her, and a thin smile emerged on full gold painted lips. “House or Imperitor?”

“What?”

A coin flashed in her left hand by way of answer, the silver glinting in the firelight as she rolled it effortlessly across the knuckles of her left hand until it reached her thumb. She tucked that last digit beneath and sent the coin spiraling toward the high ceiling. “Quickly now.”

“Uh…. House?”

The woman snatched the coin out of the air with the speed of a striking snake and set it down on the desktop beneath two slender fingers. She looked at the coin, then back to him. “I’ll give you three questions. Do you wish to change your guess? Now is the time. I haven’t peeked.”

“Should I?”

“Yes. Most definitely,” the woman admitted with a sly grin. “Two questions. Do you wish to change?”

“Can you feel which side is up?”

“Yes. One question.”

Alarion studied the woman for several seconds as he carefully considered his third question. Rather than ask, he simply answered. “Edge.”

This time her grin was wide, ear to ear delight as the woman lifted her fingers from the coin to show a Vitrian house sigil on the upward facing side. “Not many people make that guess. Especially with the geas in place to keep others from spilling the secret. How did you figure it out?”

“I have seen it before. Or a version.” The boy shrugged modestly. “One of my families used to run it as a scam. Hide a coin under one of a number of objects and ask them to pick one. If they guess right, you pull out the object and keep removing them until only one is left, at which point they’re wrong. If they guess wrong you lift up the item to show they were wrong. You never told me whether it was good or bad to choose correctly, and with three questions even an idiot could figure out which side was up.”

The genuine version of this novel can be found on another site. Support the author by reading it there.

“It is the illusion of choice,” she said, still grinning. “You would do well to remember that.”

“What would have happened if I answered wrong?”

“It depends on how wrong you were.” The woman snapped her fingers, and a candle atop a nearby candelabra flickered to life. It was one of nine, each spaced equally across three of the office walls. “Guessing correctly counts as a challenge, meaning you’ve only eight left to complete. Guessing the actual facing of the coin is simply a failure. And if you somehow bungled your way into getting that wrong, then you’d be ejected.”

Alarion’s brows raised. If it was that easy to fail out entirely, he ought to be quite a bit more careful. “Elena said there would be a guide, is that you?

The woman tilted her head, as if seeing a different side of him.

“I am your guide, yes. My name is Valentina Lyons.” When the name clearly rang hollow with the young man, she added, “I was an incarnation of Lal Viren.”

That, at least, got the more traditional response. Alarion looked at the woman dumbly for a moment, as if not understanding. Then he did something, a gesture halfway between a bow and a kneel, as though he could not decide which he was supposed to do. The end result had him half bent over, standing on one leg with the other bent up beneath him looking for all the world like the worst possible impression of a chicken.

“Oh. Oh no, that is just… please.” Valentina waved him upright with her hand for fear of being caught up in the second hand embarrassment. “We can dispense with formalities.”

“You are a god.” Alarion protested even as he obeyed her request.

“I was,” she smiled. “And sort of still am. It is complicated. While we’re here, Valentina is fine. Val is even better. My time in the sun is long over and I’m happy for the chance to be normal.”

Alarion studied the woman more closely, thinking back to what Elena had said on the subject of the mothers and their incarnations. “Are you still alive? Are you an emulation?”

“How do you-” Valentina’s voice was sharp, with surprise more than anger, as she was seemingly cut off in mid-sentence. “I know. I know! It’s fine. No, I am not an emulation, and I’m not allowed to talk about that.”

“Not allowed to?”

The woman spit him with a pointed stare.

After a few breaths, Alarion picked up on her body language and asked, “That counts as talking about it?”

The look continued with the addition of an almost imperceptible nod.

“I am Alarion.” The boy said instead of pushing the subject. He offered the back of his hand in Vitrian greeting only to have it clasped within her smooth palm instead. “It is nice to meet you.”

“No need to be formal.” Even she didn’t sound convinced as she released his hand. “Again, I’m Val and welcome to the Dungeon of the Nine Candles. Do you want to get started immediately? Or do you need to rest first?”

“I am ready to start now,” said Alarion, though his eyes were narrowed. They’d started already, hadn’t they? Was this another word game? Or just a poor turn of phrase. “I do not want to be rude, but I only have a couple of weeks to get as far as I can.”

Valentina raised a carefully sculpted eyebrow. “You’re entering a challenge dungeon in a rush? That is certainly a decision. But very well, step into the circle there, on the floor.”

Alarion turned his head, about to ask what she meant when he saw it. The once pristine wooden floor was now marked with crimson sigils that spanned out in eight directions, similar to the diagram he’d been shown of the various magical affinities. No, not just similar to. This one was more complex, with a hundred arcane characters etched in at various intervals, but the core of it was identical to the diagram he’d been shown.

He was also certain that it hadn’t been there when he’d entered the room. It would have been impossible to miss, even with Valentina distracting him.

“Well? I thought you were in a hurry.”

“Is it safe?” Alarion asked skeptically.

“A smart question, but yes. Everything in this room is safe. Unless you do something stupid and stab yourself with it or something. Stupidity is outside the realm of even a god.”

“Which you say you are not anymore?”

“It is complicated.”

“You don’t seem like a god.”

“That is complicated too.” The woman slid from the desk and landed on the floor with a soft thud. “I give you my word that any risk of death or serious injury will be signposted. I’ll explain how it works, but first…”

She gestured once again to the circle, and with no reason to refuse her, Alarion stepped inside.

He felt a pulse pass over him, the hair on his arms all standing at sudden attention for a follow-up that never came. Instead, the woman outside made a few short gestures before her face scrunched up at something he could not see. Another wave, and the circle unraveled into nothing.

“Two-Hundred and thirty-eight?” she asked, eliciting a nod from Alarion. Valentina looked about to say more when she turned her head upward. “Yes. No. Yes, I am sure. I- Alarion, you are a boy, yes?”

“Yes?” Alarion responded, so befuddled by the question that his answer sounded skeptical. “What is-”

“It’s fine,” she waved away his concern as she ushered him out of the circle, still reading over what must be system menus in her field of view. “It will take a moment to customize the first rooms to your skill set. Your status is… eclectic.”

“I do not-”

“Weird,” she clarified. “Your status is weird. I’ve never heard of an Orphan before, and that luck of yours might be a problem with balancing. I just have to- there, that should do it.”

In the corner of his vision, the three doors on the far end of the room flickered. It was as if they vanished and reappeared in the space of a single blink, and as he turned toward them Alarion could tell that they’d changed.

The original doors had been relatively featureless, simple wooden portals set into matching frames. These new ones were similar, but each had a large marking carved upon it at eye level. The one on the left was two crossed swords set behind a skull, the middle a keyhole set amidst a spiraling maze, while the last was an arcane symbol set against a background of flames. Beneath each lay three dull red diamond shaped gems each as large as his fist.

“Combat, Puzzle and Magic. A fine first set.” Valentina smiled. “Let me explain to you how this works, then you can decide where you want to start.”