CHAPTER 5

Despite the urge to collapse upon the floor with a hacking cough, he paused on the sill and took in the room. The window had no glass, instead it opened into a rectangular room - distinctly odd, given the round shape of the Tower itself. On the left side, he could see the gilt-framed ornate mirror that Audie had mentioned. It was hung in a landscape fashion, reflecting a series of gilt-framed portraits on the opposite wall. At the far end of the room was a narrow slip of wall, notably absent of a door.

“Don’t move,” he said.

Audie looked at him and raised an eyebrow.

“I don’t want you triggering something before we’ve even got in there.”

He couldn’t sense anything. Whether from summoning the flames, the priest’s potion or even just exhaustion, he couldn’t tell. He would have to rely on his wits alone.

Floor: flagstones, a central strip of red carpet between the mirror and frames, leading to the wall with the absent door. None uneven or discoloured. He did the walls next. Nothing there, either. Nothing looked likely, but it was hard to be sure in the gloom. A candlelit chandelier hung from the ceiling, providing a shadowy light in the room - despite the fact that blue skies had returned outside.

“Creepy, isn’t it?” Audie said, seeing him looking at the chandelier. “It wasn’t lit before, when I climbed up. It was dark in here.”

Satisfied, he clambered down from the windowsill, his knees creaking in protest. He waited for an awful moment, expecting some kind of deadly trap to appear. He released a breath he didn’t know he was holding.

“Magic,” he said simply. He looked down the rope. “Come now, quick as you can.”

Yannick muttered an incantation into his closed palms and then opened them. A soft orange glow bathed the entire room. Cobwebs, thick with dust, hung lazily across the corners. The thick strip of red carpet was old, but it had once been fine.

Jeran and Virgil climbed through the window.

“Is it safe, master?” whispered Jeran.

“I doubt it. But it’s safe enough for the time being.” He rounded on Virgil, who was in the process of drawing a shortsword from her belt. “Do not draw your weapon!”

She stopped still, locking eyes with him. The blade was partially drawn, revealing an inch or two of gleaming steel. He’d guessed rather than known - there was no way he could react faster than a Dusken Knight. He gestured to her and she slowly lowered the blade back into its scabbard.

“If you draw your blade, you may incite a trap. Were this a challenge of blades, we would know by now.”

The Knight simply nodded and took a ready pose, her hand hovering over the handle.

Audie sighed. “Can you draw a trap by shouting?”

Yannick ignored the comment. “It’s a puzzle. When the conditions are satisfied, it will open the door at the far end of the room. Look around, but do not touch anything.”

“Are we looking for anything particular, master?” Jeran asked.

Yannick shook his head. He had an idea, but he wanted to see if the others came to the same conclusion.

Virgil was the first to break the silence.

“Here,” she muttered, in a hoarse voice. She stood on the carpet, between the mirror and the portraits. She pointed to the mirror. The reflection of the portraits showed four figures. The first three were Sandingham nobles, dressed in the traditional manner. The fourth was a different figure, one dressed in grey-brown robes and a tricorn hat. He had wild eyes and a mad grin on his face.

“Is he holding a skull?” asked Audie. She’d drifted over and now stood by the enormous Dusken Knight, peering into the mirror. Audie barely reached the woman’s chest plate.

Virgil then pointed to the real portraits on the other side of the wall. Apart from a fine layer of dust, the individuals in the portraits were deceased. They held the same poses, but the flesh had long worn away from their skeletons, leaving only the bones behind.

“A mirror puzzle!” Jeran exclaimed. “I’ve read about these in other Towers. The aim is to make the room reflect what is seen in the mirror.”

Jeran stepped towards the mirror and peered at the reflections curiously. “This one is a little strange,” he said, pointing to the final portrait holding the skull.

“What of it?” Yannick said, stepping behind him.

“The tricorn hat, the robes… He is a priest of some description, and yet this… it is most heretical.”

“Heretical?” Audie snorted.

“Continue, Jeran.”

“The Order of St Antonic centres around the symbols of life. Our most holy of images are those of Spring, the lamb and the sunrise. All of which are symbols that represent life eternal. And yet, here he holds a skull - the very symbol of death itself. I might add that he certainly looks happy about it, too.”

“Squeamishness isn’t the same thing as heresy, Jeran,” Yannick said. “Our customs must look as odd to the Sandingham eye.”

“This man wears robes not dissimilar to mine.” Jeran gestured to the portrait’s grey robes. They too possessed a trim of runes along the lapel - in a yellowed bone white rather than the red of Jeran’s. “And this hat… it’s an antheia.”

“What’s an antheia?” asked Audie.

Yannick peered forward. The mage grinned out at him from beneath a familiar headdress. Eskalisa had indeed worn a rather similar three-pointed hat when they met, although hers had been a bright red rather than this muddy grey.

“It’s the hat an Archbishop wears,” he said.

He caught a flicker on his vision. Had the portrait winked at him?

Yannick rubbed his eyes and stroked his rough beard. The madness. It was expected after casting such powerful spells - he could still hear the faint whining of the fire spirits, begging to be set free. Not a good sign.

He turned his attention back to the reflection. Jeran’s observation was an interesting coincidence, but was it anything more? It was common knowledge that the Order of St. Antonic had split - or schismed, to use the correct terminology - into the Church of Sandingham two centuries prior. It was likely that both bodies retained similar vestments, each accusing the other of heresy and stealing.

The schism was still a source of contention in diplomatic and trade negotiations. Yannick had never understood why. The people of Sandingham spoke the same language, shared a common history and even held the same festivals. You could ride half a day from the border in either direction and the accent stayed the same.

“I believe you are correct about the nature of the challenge,” Yannick said. “I can see no other way to open the door. Does anyone else have another idea?”

Audie, for once, was silent. She shook her head. The Dusken Knight said nothing.

“Very well. In that case, it is time to work out the nature of the challenge. What is the key difference between the portraits and the reflection?”

“These guys are dead,” Audie said. She ran a finger along one of the dusty gilt frames. “Long dead.”

“And in the reflections, they are alive,” added Jeran.

“We must bring these portraits to life,” Yannick said.

The party stared at him with barely concealed surprise. Was he going mad already?

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“I’m not sure we can bring a portrait to l-- from a state of death, master,” Jeran said.

“I’ve done my share of Towers. The answer in these sorts of things is usually self-evident - even if the how to get there is not.”

Audie and Jeran looked baffled. Virgil looked at him with an unreadable expression, her face hidden behind the faceplate.

“How do we bring them… to life?” she said, in a quiet voice. Audie and the priest jumped.

Yannick frowned at the skeletal figure on the canvas. “Let’s start with prayer. Jeran, could you try a chant for our first friend over here?”

The priest’s face went pale. He shook his head. “Supplications to the Father are not to be taken lightly. I am sorry master, but I cannot pray for an object. Much less a dead one! It is almost blasphemy. I am not some conjuring revivalist.”

“Indulge me,” said Yannick.

The priest looked to the scout and the knight, but they offered him no support. Uneasily, he walked to the first portrait. With a final shake of his head, he lifted his arms to the frame and began to chant.

A familiar soft blue glow began to emanate out from his hands. Esk was right, thought Yannick. He’s a remarkable healer. Most priests he’d worked with couldn't concentrate their aura into one body part that well - meaning that a large portion of the prayer was lost.

The glow faded away and Yannick stepped closer. The portrait still showed a skeleton in her decayed finery. He checked the portrait to see her reflection, still alive.

“Did it work?” asked Audie.

Yannick turned back to the party, shaking his head. “No. I thought it unlikely anyhow.”

“Unlikely?” echoed Jeran. “Then why, in the name of the Father, did you make me do that? I could be inquisitioned for such an act.”

“I had to be sure. In any case, it seems unlikely we would be tested on a skill the Tower is well aware we possess.” Yannick studied the frame, searching for a clue.

“The tower is aware? It’s alive?” asked Audie in a hushed tone.

“Not alive like you or me, but it’s believed they have a degree of… responsiveness. They react to the world around them, but there’s no proof they have any will or awareness. Like a plant,” Jeran said.

“Were they built like that?” Audie asked.

“It’s not clear.” Jeran had recovered from his earlier protestations. Typical of a priest - the opportunity for a lecture ministered all wounds. “When the First Footing arrived on this continent, the Towers were already here, of course - exactly what they were or what was inside them was unclear. Most were entered at some point, but it was only really after the Schism that Antonic scribes began to--”

“How do we bring these things back to life?” barked Yannick, cutting off the priest. “Let’s spread out. Focus, people. Time marches on.”

The carpet. The portraits. The reflections. He went through the elements of the room over and over in his head. The carpet. The portraits of the dead. The reflections of the living. The carpet. The portraits of the dead. The reflections of the living. The carpet. The portraits of the dead. The reflections of the living.

The carpet leads to the door. The carpet leads to the door. The red carpet leads to the door.

He stopped his train of thought. He knelt down and examined the carpet. He ran his fingers over the weave, looking for a clue. There was something missing, an element they hadn’t yet caught.

There! In the weave. What was that? It was a set of interlocking symbols, woven through the carpet, almost too small to see. Triangular, with a line cutting through it.

“Jeran,” he called. “Come here, will you?”

“Master?” said the priest, kneeling at his side. “Are you feeling quite well?”

“What’s this? This symbol?” said Yannick.

“I can’t see--”

“Look closer.”

The priest knelt closer.

“You see the triangle?”

Jeran nodded. “I do.”

“Do you recognise it?”

There was a soft rustling as Jeran gathered up his robe and pointed to one of the runes etched on the edges. “It is this one.”

“What does it mean?” Yannick asked.

“It is a chalice filled with the liquor of life. Blood, in layman’s terms.”

Yannick stood up and looked at the paintings. Surely it couldn’t be that simple?

“Audie,” he called, and the scout bounded over, clearly bored by the long wait.

“Hand me your knife,” he said.

She whipped out a silver blade. The handle was unadorned, but the blade looked razor sharp.

“What are you going to do with it?”

Yannick took the blade in his left hand and cut a long, deep slice across his palm. It began to bleed instantly. Audie looked at him with horror.

“Master, I…” began Jeran.

He ignored the priest’s and approached the first portrait. He wiped his bloody palm across the dusty canvas. Then he took a step back and looked at the portrait.

It was an eerie, slow change. At first, the bones seemed to grow less brittle and yellowed, recovering some of their bright colour. Then flesh seemed to spring from nowhere, wrapping around the bones and inside the cavities. Before long, a woman was smiling at him, wrapped in furs and jewels.

He took a look at the reflection. It mirrored the portrait.

Yannick took a step towards the next portrait and smeared blood on that one too. Nothing changed.

“One per customer,” he said. “I’m afraid someone else will have to go next.”

Jeran stared at them with an expression of barely-concealed disgust.

Audie bounded up next to him and stole the knife out of his hand. Before he could say anything she had sliced open her palm too. She smeared a trickle of blood across the dusty canvas.

They watched as the flesh crept back onto the bones, revealing a thickset, bearded man in riding clothes. He held a bow in one hand, and the other rested upon a ferocious deerhound. It too mirrored the reflection.

“Creepy,” Audie said, giving off an involuntary shiver. Yannick felt the same. Had a draught passed into the room? “Really creepy.”

“There are two more,” Yannick said, looking to Virgil and Jaren.

Virgil strode forward, her hand resting contemplatively on the hilt of her sword.

“Best to use the knife,” said Yannick. “I wouldn’t want to risk it.”

The Dusken Knight nodded and unwound the straps that kept her gauntlet in place, revealing a broad, pale hand. With her other she took the silver knife from Audie and stabbed it deeply into her palm, digging into the flesh beneath.

Yannick winced. “Any quantity of blood will do,” he said quickly.

She dragged the blade through her pale skin. But the cut hardly bled at all, releasing only a few drops of blood.

“You can heal?” Audie said, wonder in her voice.

The big Knight shook her head.

Interesting, thought Yannick. If that was what a cut deep enough to sever ligaments looked like on a Dusken Knight, he wondered what level of abuse she must have sustained from the gargoyles to have such a deep cut across her face.

She stepped towards the third portrait and smeared her palm against the canvas. Like the others, the process of decay seemed to reverse itself. This one revealed a handsome man, dressed in the traditional formal wear of Sandingham. He smirked down at them with the self-satisfied smile of an arrogant noble. A faint wind was now evident in the room, blowing motes of dust in wild spirals.

“One left,” said Audie.

Yannick turned to look at the priest. He stood with his arms folded, a furious expression on his face.

“This isn’t even borderline. It’s blasphemy,” he muttered. “To sacrifice the blood of the living to the… not even the dead, these are objects of the dead.”

“The challenges are just that: challenges. They mean little, and the Father will not hold it against you at the Reckoning,” said Yannick.

“I refuse, master. Politely, I refuse.”

Yannick had no time for the man’s complaints. He was a fine healer and an excellent alchemist, but Yannick couldn’t run a party with a man like this. “If you want to return to Camberton and tell the Archbishop why you failed, that’s your decision. But I don’t think she would look kindly upon failure, would you?”

The priest quailed; caught between duty and his faith. Finally, he gave in and stepped forward.

“Give me the knife,” he said.

Yannick nodded and Audie passed him the knife. Cautiously he made a slicing incision along his palm, wincing as he did it. The man felt no need to hide his discomfort now - a far cry from the stoic figure Yannick had seen in battle below the tower. He waited for a moment as blood beaded along the cut. Then he shook his head and approached the fourth and final painting.

He stood in front of it for a moment, hesitating. Yannick followed his gaze to the reflection. The man holding the skull seemed to be grinning wider than ever. Finally, the priest lifted his palm to the canvas and wiped his blood across it, the distaste evident on his face.

For a long time, nothing happened. Yannick suspected the priest of some sort of sabotage. Then Jeran began to scream. He drew his hand back to himself as his palm blackened. The flesh began to blister and boil. He held the smoking hand by the wrist, staring at with wide, feral eyes of terror.

Yannick ran to him.

The wind had picked up now, creating a storm of dust. With a sense of impending doom, Yannick checked the portrait. The flesh was crawling back onto the skin of the man, the madness creeping back into the empty sockets. As Yannick expected, the portrait began to move.

A cold laughter filled the room.

He turned, dread pulling him down like a ballast. The motes of dust had formed in corporeal shapes now. A four-legged beast and three human-shaped ones. The truth sunk in now: the final portrait was no Archbishop, but a High Revivalist. A dead talker.