CHAPTER 36

I hurry down the ring of the corridor, paying attention to the specific tracks Metalface’s group left behind, until I find another passage to my right. Holes in the walls. Slots in the ceiling. Any false step could mean immediate, slicing death. And yet, the tracks lead down this avenue. I step carefully in the middle of them, dragging my feet to catch any errant raised platforms that might activate a trap.

This inner ring is narrower, the painted murals sparser and yet grander. There is a sense of continuation, but not everyone from the outer ring made it in, and the ones that did are without flaw those whose figures I can identify from memory. They aren’t just clad in leather or regular steel now, but in magical armor; they aren’t in the process of attaining levels, but of vanquishing monstrous enemies and performing mighty deeds. Valkas the Shadow defeats the twin kings of Geryon. Trugnar Giantsblood sunders the Void Eidolon. Sir Erlin Kaoren conquers the Keep of Verinior. They each look regal and heroic, avengers of evil, protectors of the innocent.

Keep walking. Don’t get distracted.

This corridor also leads to more interesting rooms, brightly lit but somber, ponderous, like the inner chambers of ancient temples. At the far wall of one of these, visible from the corridor, is a long sword wreathed in ice, perhaps a weapon fit for a dragon-slaying knight. However, lying by the entrance is a dead body, a boy with a very white face and his chest sliced open. Someone has closed his eyes and crossed his hands over the worse of the wound so that he looks almost serene. The warning is still clear enough. The tracks I’m following, easily identifiable as a single file of many footprints, never deviate from the center of the corridor, far from any passages. Going astray could well mean death, and I make sure to stick to the center path.

That is, until I reach the only entrance from where there come voices. Though I can’t see her from the corridor, I recognize the voice as Essa’s. She’s in the middle of a monologue discussing strategies and alternatives. I catch enough of it to know they’re planning how to kill the drake. The lack of guards outside, of watchers of any kind, shows how reduced they are in number. If Essa is here, I’m almost this is where I’ll find Rev.

Almost certain. In a sudden burst of inspiration, I take the emerald from my pocket and bury it on a pile of sand next to the entrance. Then, I step inside.

The room is large but very squat. There are three large depressions in the ground surrounded by shin-high walls that keep the sand out, and inside, dark, glassy and more alluring than any treasure, are pools of water.

The voices are streaming from a side room, oblivious to my presence. I stop myself from just diving in the pools. It could be a trap. And, if nothing else, I don’t want to be caught with my pants down if worse comes to worst. Instead, I stand in the middle of the room, facing the door, and call out Rev’s name.

There is a pregnant pause in which I recognize the minute sounds of weapons being picked up and put to the ready. And then Essa steps into view.

I’ve never looked at her so openly and from so up close before, but I’m sure that Essa is more haggard than in previous times we ran into each other. Her mouth is closed in a perpetual frown, and her previously short hair seems shorter and more uneven, suggesting someone went at it with a knife. But if I wasn’t playing close attention, I never would have noticed these things – her posture is still that of a leader, back straight, chin up. Her sword is still held with graceful ease, with just enough tension that she can blast into action if the moment calls for it.

Instead, when she sees me, she relaxes, though she never drops the formality. She even smiles a little before she remembers herself.

“It’s you,” she says. “Good. We were getting worried.”

“Worried?” I manage.

I was expecting a lot of reactions, but not this one. Two people step up behind her, weapons at the ready, but don’t do anything more than stare me down.

Essa dismisses my question with a flick of her hand and looks around the room.

“Where’s Rev?”

My heart stops.

“I thought she was with you,” I say, and a surge of fear courses through me when Essa’s expression falls.

“She stayed behind to search for you,” Essa says slowly. “Among other things. Up on the third level. Did you not find each other?”

The hunter they’d left behind wasn’t a hunter. She was a rescuer.

I close my eyes. Stupid. Stupid. Who else would be looking for us in the dark and away from their group? Who would volunteer to stay behind in that place, whatever the circumstances, if not my sister?

I shake my head at Essa’s question. She deflates with a short gasp, letting the veneer of strength and determination slip away for a moment, like all her hopes were renewed and then ripped away, taking with them a sizeable amount of her resilience. It only lasts an instant. Then Essa the forceful is back, commanding one of her two companions – a hopeless-looking youth – to watch the corridor outside and the other one – injured leg, straight long hair – to get back to her duties. They jump to obey. Not as if they’re scared, like Metalface’s lackeys before, but in a show of efficiency, like they’re natural extensions of Essa’s will.

Their leader turns to me then, placing two hands meaningfully on the hilt of her sword.

“Empty your pockets,” she commands.

The thought of denying her request crosses my mind, right before I realize I can muster precious little rebelliousness. I’m too tired. All too tired. So I lay down my few items with the same care and precision I’d used in the pit: dagger, rope, red potion, dice, bottle of glue.

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Essa spares a glance at the items and returns to staring me down.

“Where’s the emerald?”

“The girl that released the slimes on you took it and used it,” I say. It’s true enough.

Essa clearly doesn’t believe me. I roll my eyes and turn my empty pockets over.

“I’ve been to the Silver Door,” I say. “Think I would be here if I’d had the emerald at that point?”

She frowns like the very concept offends her.

“And leave your sister behind? From what she told me, I didn’t think you such a coward.”

Damnit, Rev. What did you tell her?

“Fine. Maybe I wouldn’t have left. I’m here, aren’t I?”

“What does that do?” she asks, barreling through my defensiveness and pointing to the potion with the tip of her sword.

“No idea. I actually found that one with Rev, on our way to Black Sword City.”

“Oh, that’s right. You’re an infiltrate,” Essa says with clear distaste. “And that?”

“Magic rope. I don’t fully know what it does, but it at least extends. Before you ask,” I say before she can interrupt. “That’s just a dagger, and that’s glue. Very strong glue. The dice I’m not sure.”

Essa’s hard gaze lingers on me for a moment still, as if she’s judging whether I’m innocent or guilty according to a nebulous scale of her own.

“The water is safe,” she says, nodding to the pools in the room. “Help yourself.”

I jump up almost too eagerly. With the taste of dust in my mouth and my tongue dry as the sand that surrounds us, I lower myself down to my knees and, without hesitation, sink my head in the pool, letting the coolness wash over me.

When I come back up, hair plastered to my face, Essa is gone. The boy on watch is looking at me curiously, but he doesn’t do more than point out the side room. Thanking him, feeling slightly embarrassed, I go in.

The side room is a square, humid place fitted with long wooden benches and small bowls burning with the same fuel-less serenity of the braziers outside. Essa is leaning over one of the benches while the girl with the injured leg sits on another and inspects a host of weapons set in a pile beside her. The amount of armament is impressive. The fact that there only remain three people to wield it is not.

I approach Essa and see that on the bench in front of her a map has been drawn in charcoal. It shows three concentric rings with passages drawn between them. The middle circle has been the subject of some discussion, it seems: lines have been drawn on it and then washed away, figures put in and erased again. Three objects remain: a large oval on one side of the circle, a cross in the very middle, and what appears to be a rendition of a skull drawn close to the oval. Essa’s eyes flicker when I approach, but she remains silent.

“Do you know where Reva is?” I ask.

“No,” she says. “But she knows where we are. So wait.”

“What’s—” I start.

“Don’t care,” she cuts me off. “If you know anything about weapons, you’re welcome to lend your services. Otherwise sit quietly and don’t interfere. You’re allowed to be here as a courtesy to your sister; don’t strain my patience.”

Her eyes never leave the drawing while she speaks, and when she’s done my feet almost move away on their own accord. My stubbornness wins out in the end.

“You’re thinking of attacking the drake.”

“Sit quietly,” she repeats. “Or you’ll be—”

“Did you ever think why you didn’t find a monster on the second level?” I ask idly.

That does get her to turn and face me, but it doesn’t feel like an improvement. The expression on Essa’s face spells murder like none other. She stands, menacing, towering above me.

“Explain,” she says. “Or I’ll drag you out of here myself.”

I let the silence stretch a second longer than necessary. Make her wait for it.

“I killed it.”

There’s a silence. I can tell the injured girl is paying attention too.

“Reva never said you were a warrior,” Essa says with a note of doubt in her voice. I use the opportunity before the chink in her armor closes.

“And I’m not. I’m not offering to go dragon-slaying for you. Not with this hand,” I raise my burnt and bandaged hand for Essa’s inspection. “But it didn’t stop me from finishing the cyclops.”

“How did you do it?” even her questions sound like orders. “If you did do it.”

“By outsmarting it. See, you’re thinking about this all wrong – you don’t need to face any of these things head on. They’re not enemies to be defeated, they’re obstacles to go around.”

Essa shakes her head. I’m losing her, I know, but for a moment there, just an instant, I thought…

“I commend you for your bravery. If you killed anything even close to the beast in this floor you did much more than I managed.” The praise and humility catch me by surprise. “But it’s not the same situation. Please leave me. I need to think.”

She sounds as tired as I feel, both still moving out of sheer momentum. But there’s something about her manner, her voice, that sets us apart.

“You’ve given up.”

I regret it immediately as I say it, but not quick enough to stem Essa’s temper. She jumps with a roar, grabs me by the arm, and pulls me out of the room. The girl with the injured leg yells after her, but she doesn’t stop, headed for the corridor. The boy on watch raises an eyebrow as we pass, but still she doesn’t give him the smallest satisfaction as she passes into the ring and takes the beaten middle path, going the opposite side I came from.

Her hand might as well be made of stone, and either by luck or by design she caught my good arm. All I can do is let myself be dragged through the sand, losing my footing with every second step, but knowing Essa won’t stop no matter what I plead. Whatever she has in mind, I resolve not to beg, not to give her the satisfaction.

We don’t walk long. There’s a passage to the left, narrow and cramped, nothing like the broad ones this level has gotten me used to, which Essa pulls me right in front of before she lets go.

The room beyond is the biggest I’ve seen so far. It’s not so much a large as a space so enormous it can barely e called a room. Torches blaze at regular intervals in a spiral circling up towards the distant vault of the ceiling.

“That’s the door out of here,” Essa says, pointing to the middle of the room. I step forward to take a better look at the Golden Door and Essa rests a firm hand on my shoulder. I barely notice. There’s something else I’m focused on, something that, absurdly, seems even more interesting than a final way out.

To one side of the room is a mountain of gold. I’m thinking, What could I buy with that?, but on a second plane I know that the question is meaningless, that that amount of gold – gold! Not even silver! – would be enough to buy the whole of Reach and coat each wall with coins. It’s the sort of fortune kings dream of being ransomed for.

As I’m perusing this fortune, discovering the jewels and the finery mixed in with everything else, the chalices and the chests, a throne peeking from under a pile of gold that all but buries it – I see the gold blink.

Wha—

The pile explodes. There’s a feeling of movement, of danger, as coins fly in every direction, and then Essa pushes us away from the door, falling on top of me right before the world bursts with sound and fury. Even at a distance, I feel the heat, persistent, increasing, and roar that’s loud enough that it feels like my ears are splitting. And then it’s over. The sound of slow, heavy steps crunching sand follows, and then the clink of coin as the golden mountain is displaced in avalanches of little fortunes. Only then does Essa stand.

“Mind where you place your feet,” she says vaguely, wiping sand from her clothes.

I stand slowly. I’m shaking all over. My heart feels like it’s going to jump out of my mouth.

I look at Essa. I don’t need to even ask the question. Essa nods as she pulls her hair back and away from her face.

“Yes. That was the drake.”