I’d returned to the stream and refilled the bottles without incident. Half the water was brown, but the side of the stream furthest from the giant ticks still ran clear. I’d spent the rest of the day in my room fiddling with the bottle there and planning my next spell.

I’d briefly considered emptying the pool with them, but that sound both dangerous and boring, which I was trying to avoid. The spell I’d almost entirely decided upon as my gear had been drying, so that too occupied very little of my time.

Eventually, I resorted back to my old faithful of bringing up the run in front of my eyes, and losing myself in its...

Dawn broke with the sound of whispers.

Intoxicating Blood

That was a hell of a thing to wake up to. It wasn’t doing the whole “dark magic isn’t evil” argument any favours either. Probably be pretty useful if I ran into any vampires though.

Marshlight

I began my day by taking care of business the old fashioned way. I wasn’t about to risk my spell in its entirety while I had easy access to clean water and parchment.

I fed and watered myself before readying my wax and spellbook and crouching down by my fish casket. It was time for a new spell.

Will-o’-Wisp. I lifted the cask with ease and ran to the opposite end of the room, then back again. I slowed to a walk, then ran again, alternating the speeds at ran-

Whispers filled my head, long tattered fingers struck from the shadows of my mind, tore my concentration to shreds.

Bark Swarm

“Bitter Waters!”

I’d been expecting the interruption. I was a mage after all. We weren’t called wise for nothing. We were taught to pay attention.

And what I’d now noticed, and before somewhat expected, was I was far more likely to be interrupted if I took a while to get around to recording my new spell in the morning. That, or the interruptions were getting worse.

“I’ll tear this sun-denied castle to the ground!” I grumbled.

Mages were also taught acceptance, but that lesson had had more trouble sticking. This whole dungeon felt like it was a continuation of my master’s lessons. Probably was in a round about fashion. “Every setback a lesson, every hardship an opportunity” as he’d put it. “Life is a metaphor for life” and all that.

If the tentative pattern I’d established was anything to go by, the sooner I started rerecording, the better.

Will-o’-WispII. I lifted the cask (again) with ease and ran (in a slightly worn-out manner) to the opposite end of the room, then back again. I slowed to a walk, then ran again, alternating the speeds at random. Four lights danced about me as I ran, two of them staying with me the whole time, two others dying twelve minutes before it ended.

Levitate: An object weighing up to 80lbs is moved following the whims of the mage. Two lights swirl about at the beck of the mage, lighting such areas as they desire. The object can be moved at up to the speed of a gentle run.

I snapped my spell book closed with satisfaction. That would do the trick.

I was out of light spells, but by this point I could make the journey in the dark. I held my sword out in front of me to guide my passage and headed for the pool room. Time to retrieve Master Tom Oldshoe’s treasure.

***

Of course, I needed to see the chest in order to cast my spell on it. Somehow this had only occurred to me after I’d bashed my shins on the retaining wall of the pool. There was no helping it.

Magic Sword

I sent the sword to hover above me while the two jack-o’-lanterns dove into the pool. It took less than a minute to find the chest again, now that I knew where to look.

Now that it was closer, I was able to lean over the retaining wall and, by stirring the surface of the water with my magic sword, occasionally get glimpses of it through the waves.

That was all I needed.

Levitate

The box rose into view. My brief glimpse of it before, when I’d nearly dashed it to pieces against the ceiling, had done little to appraise me of how truly small it was. The little iron box was a third the size of bread box, if that. It looked like iron anyway. The hob had suggested the box had been in the pool for some time, yet the box showed no sign of rust.

Another mark against the pool being water.

A quick examination revealed the box was secured with a lock which had also failed to rust. Unfortunate. I’d promised to retrieve the chest and its contents, not give them to Master Tom after all. I didn’t know how I’d slipped that one over the hob’s head, but it seemed he’d get the last laugh. I’d been banking on stretching the definition of retrieve anyway.

I sent box and invisible sword hovering ahead of me as I walked back to Tom’s abode. The path was fairly long and twisting, and I’d only been there once before, but I managed to get back to the portcullis without getting lost.

I lifted it to allow my sword and box to pass, then ducked under after them. Once more I was hit by that strange odour outside Tom’s house. What was that? It was like nothing I’d ever smelled before, and yet, somehow familiar. Tom would know, of course. For a price. Maybe that was why it was there in the first place. To drive people mad enough to pay it.

I knocked on Tom’s door.

“Just a second! Just one second! Who’s there? What’s that racket? Who’s knocking at Master Tom Oldshoe’s door?”

“Oswic of Blackbridge, Master. I’ve come to fulfill my end of our bargain.”

Tom let out a merry cackle, “Master Oswic, Sir! Wonderful! Wonderful! Old Tom had wondered if Sir had forgotten where Tom lived. Where has Sir been?”

“Your chest proved difficult to retrieve, Master, but I got there in the end.”

The door swung open to reveal a beaming Tom, “Excellent Sir, most excellent! Where is it? Ah! It is there, Master Tom is going blind in his old age. Can’t tell a turnpike from a tea kettle. Set it down on that table there Sir.”

It didn’t escape my notice that Master Tom hadn’t gone to grab the still wet chest from me.

Still, I did as Tom bid and followed the chest into the room.

It was as if the doorway led not to another room of the dungeon, but was a portal to a lord’s favourite den in their manor. Perhaps it was.

Tom’s chamber was large, though not compared to any other room in the dungeon. It was about the same size as the cell I’d been bound in. He’d decorated the place to be quite cozy, with rugs on the floor and strange looping carvings on the walls. A little fire burned merrily in its hearth in the corner. A pot bubbled gently atop it. A night stand and a tiny bed were bundled near it, and a large dining table stretched by close enough to aid in Tom’s cooking. The far walls were hung with lanterns, and between them Tom had wedged a number of shelves which stood proud under the weight of books, baubles, and knick-knacks.

Laughter filled the room. The laughter of little girls, much like all the other small rooms in the dungeon, but much louder and far more numerous. Rather than emanating faintly from the walls it filled the air. A knot in my neck eased I didn’t know I had and my gaze became at once sharp and clear. I had even realized I’d been feeling so worn down. It had just snuck up on me. A smile came unbidden to my lips though I couldn’t fathom why. I still felt the glowing wholeness of the dryad suffusing my being. This was different. Simpler. Gentler. The simple ease of coming home, not the deep current of boundless creation.

Tom had probably made his home that way on purpose, to lure weary travellers astray, and to set them on edge.

I set the chest on the dining table.

“There you have it, Master. Unbroken and untouched.”

Tom skipped over and stood on tipped toes to better observe his chest. The furniture, save the bed, was all of the size of a normal human for some reason.

“One second Sir, and Old Tom will fulfill his bargain as well. Master Tom merely wishes to inspect his goods, Sir, to make sure of Sir’s promise.”

Tom gave a snap of his fingers and the chest sprung open, revealing its contents.

A single round bottle of maroon liquid, cushioned in a seat of velvet.

Tom beamed at me, “Very good Sir, very good! Until we meet again!”

Tom doffed his hat and gave me a flourishing bow-

I blinked. The room was gone. So was Tom.

***

Trying to figure out what Tom had done was nearly impossible. It was only by his word that I knew of the warlock’s influence on my mind in the first place, and only by his word I knew it was gone. Supposedly. Were he not an elf I’d think the whole thing was set up. Even then, I had my doubts.

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I probed the depths of my mind for a change and found nothing. Not that I expected to find one. The probing mostly involved poking the roof of my mouth with my tongue, which did little to yield me answers.

Were the warlock spells gone?

Piercing Shield

Spawning Cauldron

Hindering Claw

Serpent Moment

Intoxicating Blood

I was suddenly assaulted with a deluge of whispers. The swirled about me, almost physical. The room spun and the ever present laughter of the dungeon was drowned out by their repeated phrases.

I collapsed to my knees, eyes shut, hands over my ears, but still the whispers continued. I hadn’t expected it to, but moving closer to the ground and shutting off my senses did let me keep my balance.

I fought down the voices, forcefully ignored them one by one. It was a skill like none I’d ever exercized before, but it worked. The whispers subsided.

Tom hadn’t removed them then. The dark magic was separate from the warlock’s influence. The idea was something of a relief. They didn’t have exclusive control over their practitioners. The were not united in their goals. They could still fight against one another. Still stymie each other’s efforts.

I stood and took in my new surroundings.

I was clearly in the same room as before, minus Tom’s furnishings. The furniture, rugs, personal effects, hearth, and lanterns were all gone, but the doors and strange carvings on the wall remained. The last two items hurt more than even Tom leaving. Access to light and fire would open whole worlds of possibility for my spells. A proper light spell especially would allow me to navigate the dungeon without the need for my demonic eyes. Not that I had a way to get rid of them anymore.

I’d ran into Tom twice in two days. I might yet meet him again.

I headed back through the door I’d entered by (through the door I thought I’d entered by) to get my bearings. Sure enough, I remembered correctly. I was back in the large, strange smelling room with my ‘X’ on the north wall.

North was straight through Tom’s former abode then. I turned 180◦and marched over to the opposite door. I still had my magic sword and teleportation spells and I wasn’t about to pass up the opportunity to keep exploring.

My sword to carved an X in the wall while I studied the door. Both door and frame appeared safe. Still, I didn’t trust my limited knowledge of traps to truly know what to look for, so I readied my spell book and corporeal sword all the same.

I turned the handle with my sword hand and-

Stuck.

Of course it was stuck. The hammers of my carpenters would shake the earth.

A few good kicks and a shoulder shove later and-

Thwap. Thwap.

Two darts were sticking out of my chest.

Huh.

I reached up with my sword hand and pulled them out. They hadn’t gone in far, not even fully penetrating my armour. If I brought a will-o’-wisp close enough, and squinted just right, I could just about make out an oily sheen on the surface of one of the darts. Poison, probably.

I tried to match the angle of impact to where the darts could have come from. It only took a moment. A series of holes lay beyond the door about a foot from the frame. They were angled inward to shoot through the door as it opened.

Try as I might, however, I couldn’t figure out how the trap had activated. String? Gears? Shifting weights? All were possible (probably) but I couldn’t find evidence of any.

Still, the holes gave me something to work off of. Next door I’d keep an eye out for them. They couldn’t always be on the opposite side of the door.

The corridor beyond turned left almost immediately. Its northward journey ended with a horrifying relief made up of demonic faces. Dread rose in me. I wanted to look away, but found I couldn’t. I was compelled by an unseen force, far more powerful than any enchantment. Sick curiosity drew me forward, wholly natural and horrifying. The face in the centre of the wall, surrounded by leering devils and succubi of ethereal beauty. The face whose eyes stared directly into mine, with a look of stricken horror carved into its stony features. The face whose weathered visage spoke of decades, if not centuries dwelling beneath the Bleakfort.

That face was my own.

***

I reached out a hand to touch the horrific carving. It was a mirage. It must be. A clever illusion. Another mirror, set between the gargoyles surrounding it.

My gloves pressed against hard stone.

Someone had carved my face, warped as it was by the demonic altar, long before I’d ever come this way. What if I’d found this hallway before the altar? What if I’d died in the cell? What if I’d succumbed to the ice fog?

Who were the other demons? And who had wasted an apparent gift of prophecy to show them to me? Or show them to others who lived in the fort? Was it a warning? Or was it the very carving which had led to my capture?

I’d thought I’d been captured to record dark magic spells for the warlocks, but I still didn’t know if that was possible. Besides, they could have captured any number of magi to do so, or simply learned the techniques of true magic themselves if it was possible.

Perhaps there was a temporal order to things. You couldn’t become a warlock then a true mage, only the other way around.

That explanation would have sufficed a minute ago. But this carving now raised all sorts of questions.

I sheathed my sword and drew my hammer. Whoever had made this had made it for a purpose. Perhaps they’d left me a further message. I struck at my visage with my hammer, putting all of my supernatural strength behind the swing. Another blow echoed through the corridor, than another rang in my ears. Not a single flake of stone was disturbed. The points of impact were barely scratched.

I lowered my aching arm. That was no natural carving. No ordinary stone. Whoever had made it had wanted it to last.

A trap followed by an adamant warning. It meant something, even if I had not idea what it was. Perhaps I’d find further answers ahead.

I turned to my left, not bothering to attempt to carve an X next to the faces. Even if I could pierce the stone, I could see the corridor was short enough not to warrant the effort. It turned right once more almost immediately, revealing an archway with another room beyond.

There was a hiss behind me.

I spun, magic sword, sword, and spellbook at the ready. One of my will-o’-wisps darted back down the corridor, the other shot off into the room beside me to prepare my retreat.

There was nothing.

There was nothing and yet...

The lights of my jack-o’-lantern wavered. The hissing didn’t stop. Lights? I saw my swords drooping before me. I was seeing double...

...

Gas!

I could barely summon the urgency required by the thought. It was filling the corridor. The room, it would spread out there. Hopefully be too thin. I turned my head languidly. My eyes were droopin-

No! Stay awake!

I cast Transport and Safe TeleportII simultaneously.

I landed in a heap on my gear for the third time in what, three days? My vision began to clear almost immediately. My breathing and rate sped up, returning to normal.

I called my magic sword to me as I scrambled to my feet. I didn’t know what I’d be facing in this room, I didn’t have time to find my normal sword.

Nothing charged me. No large stones fell from the ceiling to squash me. The hissing of the gas was mercifully silent. The room was empty of immediate threats.

I let my guard down long enough to find my spell book and sword, then sent my lights to scout about the room.

It was medium sized for the dungeon, though it had the tallest ceiling I’d seen by far, maybe twenty or thirty feet high. The high ceiling had been taken advantage of, with a staircase leading up to a balcony in the room with which to survey it by. The balcony was made of thin wooden beams, spaced far enough apart so that whoever was standing on it could still see what was going on directly below them.

The rest of the room was filled with iron cages. My imagination filled in the rest. A torture room. A room for an overseer to watch his slaves. A gladiatorial arena. An underground veterinary clinic.

Not a pleasant surrounding for sure, but not dangerous either. I got dressed. It was becoming a bit of a habit to don clothes and armour, rebuckle my belt, find all my tools, pull on my boots, and retrieve my sword and spellbook. I’d nearly made a solution for the whole thing but...

Transport was gone. Missing from my spellbook. I flipped through twice to be sure. It had been altered to be quicker the day before, and now it was gone. I was losing spells faster than I was writing them at this point. The dungeon was really starting to get on my nerves.

I set my sword to working on the north while I took a more hands on approach to exploring the room.

There were five exits from the room, including the one I’d come through. none of them led north and only the archway led south.

The view from the observation deck was the same as the one from the floor, only higher. The place was empty and contained no new exits or treasures. I even felt along the high up western wall to see if it contained another of the dungeon’s numerous secret doors. Nothing.

I didn’t want to go back the way I’d come. The gas might still be there, and if it wasn’t there was no reason to guarantee whatever had triggered it couldn’t be triggered again. Even if I couldn’t continue north from here, having my bearings was still useful. I could head east or west, then head south and west or east at the nearest opportunity, and try to reconnect to the explored portion of the dungeon through a trap free route.

If worst came to worst I could spend a day or two with this as my new home base until I readied my spells. The balcony was a fairly defensible position and the room didn’t smell like rotting frogs which was nice. I might even try to relocate my food here if I could find a reliable way around the traps.

The first door I tried was locked. I hadn’t bothered checking for traps this time. Last time I’d looked I’d not found anything and still triggered a trap. I was out of light spells and there was four doors to check. I didn’t have enough time.

The next door I tried, also on the west wall, swung open smoothly and silently on oiled hinges. Light poured out from the room beyond. That gave me pause. The most likely explanation was that I’d stumbled upon a commonly used door that the warlocks had bothered to maintain, but a small paranoid part of my brain was screaming at me that this was a trap. Bleakfort didn’t have oiled hinges. They didn’t have doors made by halfway competent people. It didn’t have light.

I gave the doorway a once over for teleport runes, and the space beyond a check for any visible holes in the walls or ceiling. I sent my magic sword through the doorway and panned about its edges with the blade. Then I chucked my stone from the other doorway through for good measure.

Nothing happened. No traps went off. No walls of spikes sprang from the walls to crush my like a vise, the ceiling didn’t collapse, nothing exploded. Good enough.

I stepped through the portal and nothing happened. That didn’t mean my precautions were for naught however. I’d also been observing the room beyond and had come to the conclusion that someone had been through here recently. The door had been oiled. The torches looked fresh. The torches burned. It didn’t really matter how new they looked. It had been three weeks since the warlocks had severed the connection with Bleakfort. Unless the torches were magical, any sign of life was a sign they were new.

I couldn’t use the torches. They’d die before I was ready to record my spells were ready once more, but if I found the one who had lit them I’d have access to fire and true light.

The rest of the room was empty except for a faded tapestry on the wall to my left. It depicted a battle between knights, but not a battle I recognized. Nothing of interest, at least for now.

Two doors exited the room. One to my right and one to my left. North and south respectively. I decided to try the south door first. It might be my path back to my room and around the traps. I wanted to continue following the orneas’s directions, but securing my line to food and water was more important.

Naturally, that careful line of reasoning led to the discovery that the door was locked. It was made of simple timbers, my new strength would be able to make short work of it, but I tried the north door first, just in case.

The north door fared little better. The mechanism turned, but the door itself was stuck. If I was going to be breaking down doors, I might as well start with my first choice. Besides, whoever had been through here had oiled the door I’d come through, I doubt they were going back and forth through the stuck door and pulling it shut behind them every time.

The door shattered under my assault. Each kick I brought against it tore a board free until the hole thing gaped open in ruins. I pushed through the dangling crossbeam which caused it to clatter to the floor, soon followed by the remains of the door.

Beyond the empty frame, to the left of the scattered timbers, was a stairway leading down into the depths.