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The Wayward Witch Chronicles
Part 1, "Welcome to the Show": Chapter 23

Part 1, "Welcome to the Show": Chapter 23

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Options were running short. West gritted his teeth as he racked his brain over the final six pools. Poison or potion, or inert water; how could they tell them apart?

“There’s got to be a way,” Roman muttered.

Other than makin’ someone jump in, West amended, then sighed. “Sunny, ye’ve been in here twice before now, aye? Would ye know, is it always the same substances used here?”

“I th-think so,” she said. “Always the same n-number of each kind, and… I know that p-paralysis potion, it’s always been there.”

“So do ye know how much of a dose o’ the rest would be dangerous, then?”

Sunny glanced at the pools. “P-potions, there’s always a minimum d-dose, usually about um…” she indicated a small distance between thumb and forefinger, “...a finger’s worth? And th-there’s the efficacious dose too.” West must have let his confusion show on his face, because she elaborate, “How much exposure you need t-to get peak results.”

“Ah, I see. And I’m guessin’ these ones don’t need to be drunk to work proper?” At Sunny’s nod, West rubbed his chin. “How ‘bout the toxin– ye said there’s still one o’ those left?”

The Aerie’s face darkened. “Yes,” she murmured. “It’s… p-potent. In very small d-doses. It’s… not a p-pleasant way to go.” West could only guess at the memories bringing goosebumps to her bare arms.

“Ach, aye, well. I’ve a draught which helps clear poisons. Do ye figure it’d work, should one of us get exposed?”

Blinking free from her thoughts, Sunny pinched her brows. “It… it acts f-fast. If it was only a s-small exposure, maybe. Depends on wh-what kind of cure it is.”

“Em... we’ll call that a plan B, then.” West hung his thumbs over his belt and tapped his hands on his thighs. “Time to start thinkin’ outside the box. If we cannae identify what the liquids are, then how can we get to activatin' those glyphs without touching ‘em?”

Roman peered into one of the pools. “If we could break through the tank and the brick underneath, maybe there’s a way to drain them.”

“Nae a bad idea, except that’d wreck the glyphs too,” West mused. “Keep thinkin’. Sunny, ye got anything?” The Mani woman shook her head fervently.

The swordsman screwed his face in thought. “If Vera were here, I bet one of her wands could have frozen them solid,” he grumbled. West felt a fresh, guilty lump in his throat, but swallowed it down.

“Do ye know which one?” When Roman shook his head, West said, “Why dinnae ye look through ‘em, see if ye cannae remember.”

“I already said that I don’t,” Roman objected, but just the same, he pulled the wand case from his shoulder and began sorting through its contents.

“Anythin’ else?”

Sunny sighed. “I-I’m sorry, I’m not more useful. But you h-have to understand. Both times I’ve been here, we tried th-thinking of everything, before it came down to… just taking the chance. The second time, they even used th-that stupid ladle, spent nearly an hour trying t-to empty out one of the pools, one scoop at a time….”

“Hol’ that thought!” West straightened up, eyeing the tanks. About two meters deep, one meter on either side…. “Hah. It comes down to equipment after all!” Aware that both his companions were watching him keenly, West shrugged off his pack. “I’m sure ye oughta know about these kinda packs, aye?” One item at a time, he began to unload his pack… and unload it… and unload it.

Books. Ropes. Potions. Four sprite-lights, and just in case, a mundane hooded lantern. Firestarters. He tossed a winter cloak over the growing pile, then began to unload a bulky bedroll, a magicked blanket for those especially cold nights. Then fishing nets, then a cooking pot, then dried bundles of trail breads. Odds and ends; like rope and pitons, like a lockpicking kit, like spare papers and quills and pens. A small, wrapped folder of old letters. Two spare sets of clothes, one large, one small enough for a child, and gloves and boots appropriate for hard work. More and more, enough to fill at least a large crate, laid out neatly. Finally, West stuck a lit sprite-light and his head into the bag, ensuring there was nothing forgotten.

Roman arched his brows. “Just how big is the space in your pack, West?” It wasn’t uncommon to see packs like West’s, but most offered a cubic meter of storage at the most. Going off the equipment West had produced, his was an order of magnitude more spacious.

“Big enough fer at least one o’ these pools at a time, I figure.” The Investigator grinned, pulling on a set of leather gloves. “So ‘ere’s the plan then. We put a rope around the pack, sink it to the bottom, and jes’ let it drink up whatever’s in there. That’ll get us down to maybe a couple centimeters at the bottom a’fore the liquid’ll be sloshing out faster than the pack can suck it up.” He picked out a rope from his pile of equipment and began winding its ends around the pack straps. “Roman, yer boots and gloves have nae leaks, aye?”

The swordsman glanced at his gear; boots calf-high, gloves full-fingered, both thick leather. “They’d better not.”

“Good. Then ye’ll get the honors of goin’ in once the pool’s drained.”

A scowl touched lightly on Roman's face, but he didn’t refuse. Instead, he protested, “There’ll still be some liquid at the bottom though. Enough to be dangerous, by the sound of it, and those glyphs only work if you touch them barehanded. What do we do about that?”

“Well, once ye get down there….” West nodded at the ladle. “Scoop up as much as ye can into the bag, then we’ll use a blanket or somethin’ to mop up the rest. Then it’ll be safe enough fer ye to touch the glyph, aye?” Tying off the rope, he lifted the pack experimentally by its new tether. “Ye with me on this, lad?”

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“... It c-could work,” Sunny murmured, bewildered.

Roman wasn’t eager, but he nodded stiffly. “Let’s give it a try, Investigator.”

Dipping the bag into the first of the questionable pools, West watched bubbles of air from the bag chug up to the surface, sinking the liquid’s level with every new burst. Taking care to avoid the splashes where the bubbles broke, West gently let the rope down until the bag rested on the bottom, and waited as the pool drained.

Once the bag had done all the work it could, West pulled the slack out of the rope so that the bag didn’t slouch and spill. Roman approached the edge. “Keep that rope steady, West.”

“Aye, I will,” West promised. Warily, the warrior crouched as though to sit on the pool’s edge. “Careful ye dinnae get those splashes on the edges on ye, lad. Better to jes’ take the jump.”

“I see it,” Roman said, frowning churlishly and straightening. He took a nervous breath, then dropped over the edge. His boots splashed in the remaining centimeters of fluid, but the flung drops didn’t seem to make enough contact with his skin to matter.

Scooping up the remaining liquid without touching it was tedious work. West tried not to count the seconds– they needed to move quickly, but they dared not rush.

One ladleful at a time, Roman emptied the pool. West had him latch the pack closed so there was no risk of spilling, then pulled the bag up and out. Finally, with a blanket from West’s supplies, Roman mopped the floor dry as he could. “Ready down there, lad?”

“As can be,” Roman agreed. He tried touching the glyph once with a gloved hand, but it didn’t respond. "Damn, that’s right.” He peeled the glove off, then tapped the glyph carefully and quickly.

An approving rumble tremored through the room, like a brassy horn. By the door, color seeped into the gem, starting at the bottom and spreading a third of the way up, tinging one of the three bars a golden yellow.

“That did it!” West whooped. “Climb on out o’ there, and we’ll get to the next!”

Once Roman was safely free of the basin, West carefully poured the liquid back into the reservoir. At Sunny’s suggestion, he rinsed the bag off in the fountain. Then it was onto the next pool, repeating the same process. As long as they worked slowly, and patiently, they shouldn’t have any trouble.

It was a fine thought. And if it weren’t for Vera, it might have even been true.

Roman was already at work in the next tank when West caught the hint of motion from the corner of his eye. He wasn’t sure it was her at first, looking the way she did– crawling on the ground with pallid skin, hair thickly matted down over her face. The crushed mess of her lower body was a dead giveaway, though. She made a sound like a seething burble, neck cracking as she snapped her face up to stare at him.

His heartbeat felt like it had stopped along with his breathing. West gaped. “What in the–”

The slain Glamori thrust forward. The broken bones of her lower body trailing uselessly behind her, she propelled herself on her arms, fingers digging into the rock like claws. She slid slickly over the floor as though greased by her own spilled guts. Before West could do more than shout warning, she was at his feet, wrapping one death-stiffened hand around his ankle.

“FECK!” West shouted, yanking his leg back. She clung on, filmy eyes narrowing, mouth and teeth slick with black rot.

“Steady up there!” Roman's voice pitched high with panic– West’s sudden movement had bounced the bag, sloshing liquid out. “Damn it West, STEADY!”

“West, there’s n-nothing there.” Sunny approached as near as she dared, trying to pull his attention. “Nothing’s there, West. It’s a t-trick. Whatever you’re seeing, it’s n-not real.”

Feck feck feck– “It sure feels real, lass!” he yelped. Kicking out at the menacing corpse, his foot landed on something solid. Her second hand grabbed for his leg, teeth coming to bear. Fending her off with his boot, West struggled to keep in place and keep the bag from jerking on the end of the rope. He didn’t even want to think about what poisons might be in that bite….

“The doors are b-both sealed. Nothing could h-have gotten in here,” Sunny said urgently. “Stay calm, West, it’s j-just a trick. Block it out, d-don’t react.”

“An’ what if yer wrong?!” But she was right. Sunny had been keeping watch the whole time– nothing should have been able to creep up without her noticing. If it was anyone other than Norui sayin’ it, I’d tell ‘em to go feck themselves….

But it was her saying it. And however much time had passed or whatever had changed in the time she’d been missing, his friend’s judgment was already battle-tested.

Grimacing, West dug in his heels, gluing his feet to the floor through sheer force of will, and screwed his eyes shut so he couldn’t see Vera’s corpse tightening its grip around his ankle, setting those awful teeth to his skin….

And then, the pressure lifted. Opening his eyes, Vera was gone. Even if he could still feel his skin prickling from the phantom touch, there was no grime on the floor where she’d dragged herself, no marks of clawed fingers on the stone, and most importantly, no telltale teeth marks on his leg.

West exhaled, slowly and shakily, trying to untense the muscles in his legs that had been readied for the bite. Sunny studied his face, deeply worried. “Are y-you all right, West?”

“... Aye. Thank ye, lass.” He swallowed down the last of his fear.

The Aerie straightened with a relieved sigh. “G-good.” A skipped beat. “And West… please, stop c-calling me that.”

“Ach… sorry, Sunneh.”

Roman, cursing, hoisted himself out of the basin. “What the devil happened, West? You nearly killed me!” West opened his mouth to defend himself, but Roman cut him off with a sharp jab of his finger. “You brought yourself along, West, and convinced a very competent and steady companion of ours to desert in order to do it. So if you are supposed to be here in his stead, I very much expect that you be dependable. Nothing less.”

West felt a lump in his throat. Even though his gut told him he’d done better in the circumstances than he could expect anyone else to, there was a punch in Roman's accusation that he’d come so close to letting his companion come to harm. It wasn’t guilt he felt, but a heavy responsibility.

Fiercely, Roman demanded, “Well, do you have anything to say?”

“Jes’... I’m glad yer not hurt, lad.” His softness surprised Roman. The swordsman hesitated, composed himself, and nodded.

“I’m counting on you to keep it together, Investigator,” he chided finally. “Let’s get this finished.”

West kept a keen eye out from that point on, but it didn’t seem that Whistler had any more tricks for them– at least not for the moment. With one final brass call, the gem beside the door lit gold, and the grinding of deep gears began. “Th-that did it,” Sunny marveled.

As the door finally opened, there was the small click of a latch snapping free. Next to the door, the slotted cage holding the amber gem swung open. “W-we’ll need that,” Sunny said, crossing the room to collect it.

“Well! Not without its challenges, but we made it,” Roman said, exiting the tank and wiping his gloves and boots down with the smaller of the two cloaks in West’s supplies. West, pulling his pack back to the surface, emptied it before doing likewise. He spent extra time cleaning the pack itself, rinsing it and wiping dry all the little cracks and folds before he loaded his things back in.

“It’s the last hall ahead, aye?” West tucked the last potion away. “Anythin’ in particular we should be expectin’, Sunneh?”

“Th-there's... well, it'll be easier to explain when you see it,” she said. “The f-fifth hall is as far as anyone’s gotten.”

“We’ll have to be the first to get further, then,” Roman said firmly. “Keep your eyes open, and for the sake of the Gods, West, don’t get duped by any more blasted illusions!”