CHAPTER 30

Lysander draws a bow and drops the act. He seems pleased. Muttering comes from the other side of the table, where Hilde is lying on the ground.

“You did very well, Malco,” he says. “Wouldn’t you say?”

“I don’t know. I answered it, didn’t I?”

“You did. But you could have done better. The story of these four is detailed across a few books in the library. Knowing it would have saved you a world of guessing. We’d work on that if we had the time, but time…”

The boy’s body suddenly goes limp and he stumbles with a grimace, hands to his head. A moment later Lysander regains control. The smile returns, the ease.

“Time is running out. This door,” he points to the little side door tucked away in a corner of the room. “Well, I’m not allowed to tell you where it goes. But I wouldn’t be surprised if it saved you a bit of work going down.” He gives me a huge wink with a finger in front of his lips.

I look at the door with mistrust. Could it be that easy?

“Are these really their bodies?” the question serves to buy me time. I kneel next to the Hilde. She’s all right. Just a bit confused. “The guild’s enemies?”

“Oh, no, no,” Lysander chuckles. “They’re mere props. They served their purpose for this test, I’m sure you’ll agree.”

Questions broil up in my mind. Whoever this Lysander is, he seems to know a suspicious amount about what’s going on.

“Oh, look at that,” he says, lifting the boy’s foot. Rue is wrapped around his ankle. “Your friend is back.”

“I need know where a girl named Katha is,” I ask, ignoring him and Rue’s antics. “She’s blonde, and—”

“Certainly you do,” Lysander interrupts. “But as I said, there isn’t much time. You really want to take that passage.”

“I can’t,” I say. “There are people waiting for me on the other side of the Floating Room.”

Lysander pinches the bridge of his nose in an exaggerated display of disappointment.

“Malco, I’m trying to throw you a bone here. You won’t make it to the other side.”

“What’s going to happen?”

As we talk, I’m pulling Hilde up, dragging her to the little door. At first it feels locked, but with another pull it drags open, revealing a flight of stairs going down. There’s a lit torch waiting on the inside.

How in all hells do they keep these torches lit all this time, I think vaguely.

“More than it would be fair for me to tell you,” Lysander says, palms up to bring attention to his powerlessness. “Though I might bring your attention to what those books said about the Ruby Key. Particularly its current function. And now, I’m afraid I must leave you. It was a pleasure, Malco,” he bows. “I truly do hope we meet again.”

“Wait, I don’t remem—”

The boy slumps to the floor. This time I’m ready and I catch him before he bangs his head on the floor. He’s as disoriented as Hilde, looking around and muttering to himself, and I have to prop him up against a wall so he’ll remain standing. I pick up his dagger as a precaution.

A rumble shakes the ground under our feet. Me and Hilde help each other stand, but the boy slides onto his ass before managing to get up again. Rue, shaking all over, unwraps himself from around the boy’s leg and climbs up mine to nestle, flattened, on the back of my neck. Whatever is happening is going to happen now.

“Hilde,” I say. “I need you to take this passage, you’ll be safe. I need to go and warn the others.”

Hilde shakes her head, slowly coming to full awareness of her surroundings, but then keeps shaking it.

“No,” she says.

“Hilde, I need to—”

“Malco!” she snaps. Her hand squeezes tightly around my arm. “The book called it the Ruby Keystone. It holds up the sky!” She shakes me, her eyes fierce ad wild. “Don’t you see? It holds up the fourth floor! This floor!”

She’s in shock, I tell myself. Her mind isn’t right. If the fourth floor falls, it would crush everyone underneath and kill everyone on it.

The dungeon’s endgame.

The library, the laboratory. Places people would stay and wait, searching for books, mixing up potions, enjoying their complete security. The Godtouched wouldn’t want winners such as that, would they?

As we look into each other’s eyes, I finally realize that Hilde isn’t in shock. She’s panicking.

I have to warn them, I think. I have to warn them or…

Another quake and a splash. The water in the pool, which we can just see outside the door, sloshes from side to side, and then crashes downwards in a stream of light and liquid.

The floor caves in.

I have just time enough to push Hilde towards the stairs and drag the boy behind me. He’s tall and heavy, but he’s waking up slowly and can put one foot in front of the other. In our rush, I forget the torch. It turns out to be unnecessary.

The entire wall on one side of us crumbles and plunges into the depths. An immense cavern reveals itself to us, a huge, perfect cilinder. Before our eyes, things are still falling: torches, wall, floor. The third level must have been especially tall, because the yawning mouth of the chasm opening before us is enormous. We see the giant green slime topple to the ground, free from the flotation magic that bound it, and burst into a thousand smaller versions of itself. Sections of the third floor also give way, toppling tons of stone to the second floor under it. A cloud of dust rises and obscures everything.

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We huddle on a corner of the stairwell, which thankfully hugs the wall of the cave itself. Slowly, I pick myself up and stare down at the mess of destruction. As the dust begins to settle closer to the ground, everything comes into sharper focus; the horizon recedes, more shapes come into view. The ruins of the third floor become evident; it was hardly a floor at all, but a series of walkways and passages extending into thin air, without walls to separate them. Now those bridges are broken; everything is except two stone fangs that burst up from the debris.

Those are two pillars that still stand, jutting out from the ground as if unconcerned with the disaster surrounding them. One rises until it’s a little above our heads. Sitting atop it, is the White Door. The pedestal, attached to it at the base, continues to stream black light that is lost against the darkness of the cave.

Some distance in front of us, and shorter than its brother, the second pillar holds up the Silver Door and a section of floor. There are people there, milling, coughing, and looking around themselves in shock. By the light of their torches, I recognize faces I saw before. It’s Essa’s group, but much diminished. Essa herself is standing apart from the rest, looking down at her hand. Something shines there. Something red.

The ruby.

Someone comes up behind Essa and places a hand on her shoulder. She turns in a flash, roaring, furious, but stops. The second figure is my sister. Reva pulls her into a hug that Essa doesn’t fight.

I press back against the wall of the cave, out of sight from anyone looking from beneath.

“We should go,” I whisper.

Hilde nods.

“Coming?” she asks the boy.

He’s quiet, watching us with fear and apprehension, feeling along his belt for a dagger that isn’t there.

“Edd was caught by the slimes.” Tale...” I clench my jaw. Tale waited for me until the floor fell from underneath him. “Look, I don’t know what your particular problem is, but you can come with us or try to fend for yourself.”

He hesitates, but eventually gives up and lumbers onto his feet, head down.

“Thank you for saving me. If it weren’t…” He doesn’t finish the sentence. “I’m Gaun. I… I’m sorry I attacked you,” he tells Hilde. “Tale said you were going to betray us. I believed him.”

Hilde holds out her hand. There isn’t a sliver of reproach in her expression, and though his hand envelops hers, it’s the dwarf who’s in control.

At the bottom of the steps, we find rubble. Wherever this passage was supposed to lead to, it’s now crushed and flattened by the falling stones. Slimes as small as apples make their way through the devastation, illuminated by the diffuse light of hundreds of magical torches refusing to go out even in the devastation. The slimes force us to walk or climb around them. One touch can lead to what happened to Verra and Dako, not to mention the horrific results of prolonged exposure. We’d rather pick our way carefully to the pillar than end up with an extra head.

It takes only a short while of walking through the debirs, mouths covered with cloth against the dust, to hear voices. We crouch behind a broken wall. Slivers of conversation seem to come from all around, fabricating ghosts in the cloud of grime around us.

Peeking above the rubble, I catch sight of people, straight ahead in a muttering group. A shadow descends from above, sliding down a rope.

“What’s the plan? Where are we headed?” Hilde whispers.

“We have two keys,” I say.

“Three,” Hilde says. “I still have the amulet.”

“Three, then, but two to the same door. Whatever good that’ll do us. That’s the Silver Door up there. Essa’s group has the Ruby Key, so they’ll be looking for a way down the first floor. When they leave, we’ll make our way up. Just stay close and…”

A shriek interrupts me. Something between a bray and a hiss fills the air and a shadow flies low above us, serpentine. Essa’s voice rises in a cry of command, organizing, steeling her band against fear. It’s not enough. Gravel crunches as they retreat, bumping into each other, falling onto debris. And then the monster attacks.

It’s clear this is the beast Wyl saw during her time on the third floor, but I have no idea how the Godtouched planned for such a thing to be fought or outwitted. It descends from above, coiling and uncoiling, as long as a river barge and quick as a falcon. Its many wings fan in as it hits the ground and its long neck snaps like a whip as it bites down on one of the fleeing Challengers. In a few moments, it’s all finished. Three of Essa’s people lie dead among the rubble, the rest scattered. The beast surveils its hunting grounds, takes a body up in its mouth, and flies away into the dust and the darkness. In the sudden gust, the rope flaps against the pillar.

We wait until the sounds of wings dissipate.

“Now,” I whisper.

We move up. Hilde and Gaun keep their eyes away from the ravaged corpses the beast left in its wake, but I force myself to look. I need to know none belongs to Rev. The rope is strong and knotted at regular intervals, but my good arm is still sore when I finally arrive at the top and Hilde helps me up. Gaun needs no assistance.

Whatever material the pillar is made of, it didn’t suffer a scratch when the floor above it crashed down, and now the top of it, where the Silver Door sits pristine under the protection of a vaulted ceiling, is also a wide platform. The surface of the door is engraved with complex patterns, aglow with the green light from the pedestal in front. The door leads nowhere. We shuffle in front of it, suddenly nervous. Hilde hands me the amulet with a nod and steps back.

The amulet is finer than anything I’ve ever seen, which isn’t saying much. But I bet it would feel fine even to a king, would look natural hanging from the neck of an emperor. I apply a little pressure, and the emerald slides from its resting place, identical to the one in my pocket. The slot in the pedestal beckons for finality.

“Go on,” says Gaun. He’s jittery, balancing on each foot in turn, a hopeful smile creasing the corners of his mouth.

“What if it doesn’t work?” I ask.

He turns to Hilde, puzzled, and just shrugs. “We can worry about that later,” he says, like he’s reassuring a child. “But go on, let’s see if it does.”

The three stones are in my hand, shining green, green, and blue. Three keys for two doors. Does that mean there’s more than one key per room, for every room? The books seemed clear on the notion that for every door there was one key, guarded in one specific way. The more I think about it the more I convince myself that these two emeralds shouldn’t coexist.

One key per door.

“We might only get a single use out of them,” I say.

“So?” Gaun says, taking a step forward that makes me raise an eyebrow. He shows his peaceful hands, but his face is twisted, unsmiling now, dancing on the edge of worry. “We have three stones. One for each, nothing fairer. Go on, Malco, try one. We won’t know until you try.”

We won’t, it’s true.

But I can’t. I can’t leave until I now Katha and Rev are all right.

My hand closes over the stones.

“I need to find my sister first. I need to make sure she makes it out.”

Hilde nods solemnly, like she didn’t expect anything else. Gaun looks like I just tossed the key to our freedom into a well.

“I’m sorry,” I say. “I don’t—”

He falls on me, strong arms pushing me to the floor with a cry of rage. My good hand refuses to release the stones, and the bad one, the hurt one, is too weak to close around the handle of the dagger, so Gaun is free to claw, punch, and shake me. I kick out and keep the stones away from him as far as I can stretch, but he’s fighting like a man drowning, pulling me under, squashing me under his superior weight.

I feel Rue slither from behind my neck and strike like a snake for Gaun’s eyes. He cries out, slapping away at his face, and Hilde kicks him in the head, a resounding slam that throws him off me, arms in front of his face. I try to wriggle away, but his hand lashes out and catches hold of the dagger, then he stands, slowly.

“Give me,” Gaun says. There’s a thin trickle of blood streaming from his temple, and one of his eyes is red and swollen. “I don’t want to hurt you, but you can’t… you can’t…” he begins to cry, not breaking eye contact or releasing his blade.

A click-clack interrupts our standoff. Two dice, strangely familiar, roll into view and clatter to a stop.

“Strength,” says a confident, impertinent voice.

It’s Wyl.