I was stuck.

I’d been through every door, and seen every room. The only other paths available to me lead through lava. I might be able to deal with the lava in time, either by dint of true magic or dark magic. Piercing Shield already might be enough to return. But that was assuming lava would be my only obstacle. The bath room had had one wall explode, there would be others. Landslides, collapsed ceilings, hallways filled with stone—better to find another way through.

The warlocks—or whomever they’d stolen the fortress from—clearly like their secret passages. I could afford to spend some time searching this room and the room full of rubbish and bones. The others were either too hot or too full of hostile creatures to dare attempt. If it came to it I might try summoning Tom.

I wasn’t sure how much time to give to each section of wall. The room was large and tall enough I couldn’t quite reach the ceiling, even if I dared raise my hands all the way above my head. A secret like the fungal trap door would take me seconds to find, whereas the stone panel into this very room might remain hidden after half an hour of scrutiny of the correct section of wall.

I decided to do it in several passes. A quick visual loop of the room, running my hands along the wall (which had the added benefit of feeling if the space beyond contained lava), followed by a scan with my life sight (now that I was paying attention, the stone panel actually contained a thin layer of moss all along its edge), and finally a slower scan into I went mad with boredom.

The later stages of my plan were scrapped almost instantly as it turned out the pearamid concealed a small wooden door behind it by shear virtue of its size and nothing else.

Magic Swords

I hid behind the pyramid in turn as my swords tore into it, ready for the next set of darts to come flying towards me.

The lock gave before the door under a single assault of the blades, opening the door rather than tearing it down.

I soon found myself in another hexagonal room. This one had been decorated with spiralling arms of black stones radiating from the centre like a whirlpool. At the edge opposite to me and to my left was a large kiln, beside it was a box of coal.

I’d had to scrape and beg and bargain for the handful of torches I’d managed to gather, and the three I had had been given begrudgingly. All I’d wanted was to record a fire, and now, before I had my chance, I’d stumbled across this. Funny how things went.

I didn’t have room for the coal at them moment, but I’d happily make this room my new base given the opportunity.

The room contained two exits. A sturdy looking wooden door to my right, and an open archway straight ahead of me leading from one of the corners of the hexa—hang on. I’d come in through a door set in the centre of a wall. I quickly counted the walls. A heptagon then. Seven was a powerful number in a number of schools of thought. Combined with the stones it was highly likely this was a ritual chamber or amplification chamber. I’d have to be careful not to disturb the stones. I didn’t want another volcanic eruption.

I went straight for the archway, eyes on the stones, hands on my spellbook. Unfortunately that meant neither my hands nor my eyes were paying attention to the tripwire until my foot when straight through it.

I didn’t try to be fancy and combine spells. I didn’t try to be clever and stay around to find out what was happening. The moment I stumbled on the wire, before the hissing of gas even reached my ears, I’d cast True Teleport.

The only path available to me in time to react was directly ahead of me. One moment I was in a heptagon surrounded by black spiralling stones, the next in a large natural looking chamber. The walls were wet and smooth. Grey uncarved limestone or dolomite. Dripping water. Stalactites hanging from the ceiling. Clearly a natural cave the carvers of the dungeon had stumbled upon and decided not to brick up.

A fire burned in the corner opposite me; behind me, after my teleport. It was a door, with just a trace of rock rubble edging through it. Deep red lines ran through the rubble. Lava.

The fire and colour hadn’t been my first clue. I could feel the heat even over here on the other side of the room. The walls by the fire and lava were sweating. Thick runnels of water ran down them—the sun rose—almost melting.

I blinked. Another sunrise. I’d have to ignore it. The ceiling looked like it had collapsed in several areas. I wasn’t about to write a spell in a collapsing cavern.

I’d heard lava could form caves and tunnels, but this seemed wrong. The geology of the room didn’t make sense. How could a place which couldn’t stand a few hours contact next to a small pile of lava have existed inside a volcano?

The implications were disturbing.

Had the volcano been introduced after? Could dark magic do that? Could true magic? I supposed it must be possible. Nothing was meant to be off limits. But still, an entire volcano? It might be easier to imagine the cave was transported here. Or two separate realms were brought together in a manner opposite the Bleakfort rift. Why anyone would do that, well, most things were lost to time. Perhaps this cavern had held a nice cave painting someone wanted nearer their office.

I didn’t linger. There were two door-less doorways available to me. The second looked like it had been blasted open in an explosion. I took the first. Partially because it felt safer, but mostly because it was closer. I knew too well now how looks could be deceiving.

The room beyond was filled with sand. Not a dusting of sand, but great dunes and mounds. Piles of it rose and fell. Shields poked out from the sand here and there, all of them broken. The largest pile of them was in front of the door to my left. Unlike the other rooms I’d been in, it was obvious to see how the shields had been broken.

In the centre of the room was a dragon.

As dragons went it was disappointing. It was large, sure, gigantic even, but it lacked all a dragon’s majesty. It had toad’s head and a toad’s body, and all of a toad’s squat regard. It had no legs, just a pair of grasping wings coming from its shoulders like a bat’s. It would have been as wide as it were long, if it were not for its tail; a cross between a lizard’s a scorpion’s, complete with stinger. It was nearly twice the length of the body itself, and the body was already two to three times my height from nose to rear.

The moment it spotted me its great tail coiled beneath it, and its foreleg-wings lifted its lumpen body around and low to face me. I recognized that stance. The great frogs had entered a similar one just before they leapt to attack.

I spun around and cast True Teleport. The sunrise had given me back my spell, and I was going to use it.

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I missed what happened next, seeing as I hadn’t existed for the past eight seconds, but I could put the pieces together. Sand billowed in from the creature’s room and it was croaking like a lion, trying to squeeze through the doorway. Its body was malleable enough that it was making progress.

Stalactites littered the floor near the doorway, snapped, scattered, and fallen.

The toad-dragon’s eyes locked on to me as I cast my gaze about. I’d only teleported about half way across the room. I’d left a will-o’-wisp behind me, so I could have teleported all the way, but I’d been worried about the poisonous gas. I realized my mistake only after it was too late.

Before I could react its tail came shooting out from under it towards me like a quarrel. It hit me in the chest, thankfully in one of the areas I still had armour, and sent me flying back into the room with the kiln and the gas.

The pain from the impact filled my vision with so many white dancing stars it was black, and I nearly passed out. Amazingly, I managed to keep my feet while running backwards over the black stones.

My luck gave out on me as I approached the centre of the room. I was moving mostly under my own power at this point, but as I continued to back up my heel clipped a stone and I stumbled over onto my back. It was a gentle fall, all things considered. My chest still screamed like it had been stuck with red hot pokers (for a second time), but I wasn’t in any danger.

Not from the fall anyway.

It was only then I smelled the gas. The force of my passage must have pushed it out of the way up until now. I guess it was too much to hope that it had dispersed.

Laughter. The thought came to me like lightning. I couldn’t see much more than straight up, preventing another teleport to get me out of here. But I could hear. I could hear the toad-dragon thrashing around, which was not a place I wanted to teleport. I could hear moans and the rattling of chains in the distance, but they were too far away. The walls laughed. That faint laughter was enough.

Teleport

I appeared naked and upright in the doorway between the kiln room and the cavern. There had been no time to sort through my spellbook for the correct spells to keep my gear.

Opposite me, The toad-dragon was still straining at the doorway to the cavern, but it had failed to make much, if any, progress. I’d learned my lesson. Even from the other side of the room its tail could reach me, so the moment I appeared a threw myself sideways in a roll towards the doorway oozing lava.

I was gasping from the pain as I pulled myself back up to my feet. I couldn’t breath. It was too hot. The air felt thick. My deeper breaths only served to tug on the wounds in my chest.

The giant toad creature had noticed me by now, or heard my laboured breathing. Its tail lunged towards me and I flinched back, but it fell well short. It shrieked at me, a sound I felt more than heard, though what I heard I’d heard nothing like.

My vision began to run. Lights flashed into existence all around me without illumination. Shadows formed looming figures which slunk away into the corners of my vision. The toad-dragon’s features warped and twisted, growing long fangs and burning eyes. My hand, stretched out in front of me to ward off the sound, grew wicked claws, and the fingers became long and twisted. I blinked and the images were gone, replaced with new illusions, new sensations. Dread. Fear. The smell of burnt hair on my tongue.

The toad-dragon swelled, drawing in breath for a second shriek. I sent my swords after it, slicing and stabbing.

The creature didn’t stand a chance wedged in the doorways as it was. Size and strength availed it nothing against invisible blades wielded by an unseen hand. If anything its size made it easier to target and its strength, so effective at wedging it in the doorway, was now responsible for holding it in place as I stabbed.

The toad-dragon seemed to come to the same conclusion I had. It wrenched itself free from the doorway with an explosion of stone and the clattered of another half dozen stalactites, leaving skin and scales behind in its haste.

I kept the swords at the door, forming a sort of wall as I circled back round to the entrance of the kiln. My will-o’-wisps were heavily spread out at this point, ready for me to flee in any direction. I’d have to flee on foot given my lack of spells, but even there my lights would help.

A solitary will-o’-wisp illuminated the toad-dragon. It was crouched back in the middle of its room, tail coiled under it, wings flexed. It was ready to spring. Its gaze was locked on me.

I took a step back, and tensed myself in turn. Such were the layout of the three rooms that I could only see the toad-dragon (and therefore direct my swords) if I remained in range of its tail. If things were aligned just right I might be able to launch my assault from inside the kiln room and outside the toad-dragon’s range, but then I’d be standing in the poisonous gas. I just had to hope my swords kept it on the defensive. I doubted they could stop a full out assault from the creature. It was a delicate dance.

My swords went in and began stabbing at its eyes, ears, and throat. It must have sensed some disturbance in the air, because it twisted at the last second from the attack to its eyes and my blade scraped along the ridge along the eyes instead, sending up sparks. The other attacks landed, leaving bloody tracks in its flesh. I couldn’t tell from here how serious the wounds were, deserts abound I couldn’t even tell what colour the blood was in the dim light, but it let out another one of its shrieks, so I’d probably hit something vital.

Unfortunately that meant I was blasted with the effects of another shriek. My limbs turned to stone, to bars of iron, and locked in place (Metaphorically. Once again, the limits of possibility were hard to determine in a warlock’s dungeon). I was rooted in place (figuratively), unable to move (literally), and I simultaneously wanted to vomit and scream.

Thankfully I shook off the effects almost instantly this time, either from inoculation due to exposure, or my injuries weakening the toad-dragon more than was immediately apparent. It took advantage of my brief time stunned by sending its tail my way once more.

There was no time to react. Even if I hadn’t been stunned the creature was just too fast. It made a viper look slow.

While its speed was as fast as ever, its aim was not. The tail struck the ground between my legs, --the sun rose—sending up chips of stone.

That had been two sunrises in the space of a minute. They were accelerating. If I had my spell book I might have been able to take advantage of it. As it was, I barely noticed it, focused instead on standing my ground in the face of the toad-dragon’s attack. If the dolomite fletchette spray had impacted more than my shin and knees, risen just a little higher, I might not have managed it.

I brought my blades down and around, chopping at its tail. Only two managed to pierce its thick hide, the warts and nodules appeared almost like bone or rivets of steel, such was their strength. Of the two, only one went deep enough to severely harm the creature.

It shrieked again and whipped its still extended tail at me. Neither attack was effective. I shook off the daze from the shriek long before its tail whiffed harmlessly in front of me, several feet off target. It slammed into the cavern wall instead with a loud boom. The stalactites quivered on the ceiling, but none I could see fell.

If the toad-dragon was going to keep its tail extended, I was going to keep trying to sever it. None of my blows landed within the previous cut, but one of them managed to pierce through its armour regardless. It was a shallow wound, but still one which drew blood. At the very least I could bleed the monster to death.

My next series of attacks were much the same, most of my blades bouncing harmless off, or skittering along the surface of its skin. I hoped I was giving it bruises. My light wounds were met with a counter attack of its own. It recoiled its tail, in what I thought was an attempt to protect itself. But as I before I could direct my blades to swoop around or go for the eyes instead, the tail lashed out again and this time it struck true.

The stinger at the front was barely slowed by my armour, adding a third hole to my collection. I saw stars and then cavern ceiling rushing past. Then I saw a ceiling of cut stone and I was once more lying more or less in the centre of the room with the kiln in a pile of all my gear.

The toad-dragon shrieked in triumph, and this time I felt it fully. My blades lashed out blindly as I thrashed on the floor. The toad-dragon let out another shriek, this one altogether different. Pain, perhaps? Both paralyzed me. Blinded me. I vomited, and then began to choke on the vomit. I couldn’t move to save myself, could barely pull together the thought that I was in danger from something other than the ceiling above me opening into leering mouths which breathed fire.

Thought was enough.

Safe Teleport