“You will not help?” Ivkarha demanded of the two old sages. “If there is a way, I must know. My friend can not be left there. I swore on this, and so it shall be.”
Rahaam and Niyaro exchanged looks before Rahaam gave a shake of his head. “I wish it could be, but we can not take the risk that the one there can gain a foothold. We grieve for your friend, but would you sacrifice all the world for him?”
“I would not,” Ivkarha admitted, “And even if I would, he would refuse. This I know. But there is a way, I can see.”
“There is,” Niyaro admitted. “Most dangerous to attempt, and not just for the one that travels it.”
“How so?”
“The Stairs of Night, they are not a true thing, nor is the Uttermost Stars. To walk it is to walk unreality, a myth more than what is. Only those of the strongest will can walk it, and of those most are left broken by the ordeal. Aye, even among the strongest. Those of lesser mind are broken earlier.”
“That is all?” Ivkarha asked. “A broken mind?”
“No, child, it is not. You open yourself up to the creature of the unreal places, and invite it in, and through that, invite it into the world.”
“I see,’ Ivkarha said firmly. She drew her sword and lay it down on a table beside her. “Can you use that?” she asked.
“Once I could,” Rahaam responded, “In my youth, before I found a purer path.”
“I know it well,” Ivkarha told them. “I have lived by it, and if it is time, shall die by it. I am the last of my people, the Ar-Armal, and when I die all memory of them shall be gone. But be that as it may, I am not afraid. There must be a way.”
Rahaam spread his hands apologetically. “I wish that there was,” he told her.
Niyaro cleared her throat tentatively. “There might be,” she said quietly.
Rahaam frowned as he turned towards her. “There is not.”
“What of the Call of the Ancient?” she asked.
Rahaam shook his head. “That is a myth, a fable.”
“What is this Call?’ Ivkarha asked.
“There is a story, no more, of a foe of the creature, simply known as the Ancient.”
“It is from one source alone, a madman whose writings are all but illegible,” Rahaam added. “Few pay any credence to him.”
This content has been misappropriated from Royal Road; report any instances of this story if found elsewhere.
“Tell me more,” Ivkarha demanded of them, frowning. She liked not the back and forth, the straying from the point of the talk.
“The Ancient oppose the foe, yet was itself of a place beyond, far beyond, and could not touch our world, yet sought to protect it. The Call was its means, a way to walk the Stairs of Night not to the place of the foe, buts its place”
“For what purpose?”
“Those that believe the story say that the two realms are linked, twinned together in the unreality,” Rahaam stated. “Yet while the dark place is known of, this place is but a myth. None have seen it.”
“And to walk the Stairs to this place would be safe?”
“I can not say,” Niyaro said, “For none have tried.”
“Then I shall be the first,” Ivkarha stated, face stern and determined.
“We can not guarantee that it shall work, or even that you will survive,” Niyaro told the warrior woman.
“I understand,” Ivkarha replied. “It would not be the first time that I have walked into a situation that I was not likely to emerge alive from. Yet without risk, there is no life. Tell me what I must do.”
Rahaam ran a hand over his head while Niyaro tapped a finger to her lips. “It is hard to say, exactly,” Niyaro responded. “As none have answered the Call, it is mere speculation as to how to achieve it. But perhaps,” she started to say, shuffling off to where a book was set aside, taking it up and starting to read through it. “Yes. Here.” Rahaam shuffled over to join her, to see what she was looking at. He read and then nodded his head. “It is worth a try. How bad could it get if it does not work?”
“Well, she could die,” Niyaro pointed out.
“There is that, yes, but think of what we could learn.”
“That is not my aim,” Ivkarha told them. “Now, what is it?”
“There are certain rites we need to undertake, certain rituals and items to aid the process. We shall open the Stairs of Night and set your feet upon the path, but beyond that, we can not help.”
“Much,” Niyaro added. She shuffled off again, to one of the shelves, and came back carrying a long bundle wrapped in cloth. “You may need this,” she said, passing the item to Ivkarha.
With a puzzled expression, Ivkarha took it and started to unwrap it, revealing a sword, magnificent in its design and manufacture. A pale green stone was set in the hilt and it seemed to take in the light of the room and reflect it back in an array of colours.
Ivkarha raised it to gaze upon its length. “What is this?” she asked, marvelling at the sword.
“There is some conjecture on that,” Niyaro said, looking across to Rahaam. “It is old, yet not, and tied to the Stairs of Night.”
Rahaam gave an amused snort. “That is debatable. All that can be said is that it is not of this world and might be related to the realms beyond reality, but no more than that can be said. At the least it will function for you on the Stairs of Night, whereas your regular sword would not. How so, we can not say.”
Ivkarha lowered the sword and looked at them. “Why would one need a sword to walk the Stairs? Did you not say that the danger was to the mind?”
“Yes, and no,” Niyaro responded.
“It is either one or the other,” Ivkarha retorted. “It can not be both.”
“It is your mind that will be rent of its sanity,” Rahaam stated, “But there are things, unknown and uncharted, that stalk the stairs, and they are just as dangerous to your mind as what else is upon the Stairs. If you are to survive, then a good sword will be of use.”
Ivkarha nodded, her face set and grim. “Then I shall accept it, and use it well. Prepare, then, the Call, and I shall ascend the Stairs and seek where they lead.”