Orb Sceptre Throne

the lantern on the bench next to him. The lad squinted his puzzlement. His face gleamed sickly pale, sheathed in sweat. ‘You keep the light,’ Antsy told him. ‘I’ll have a poke around.’ Corien drew breath to object but Antsy held out his sword, pommel first. Offering a tired smile, Corien took it. ‘Look after Orchid here while I’m gone.’

Orchid had the sense not to object to that bit of chauvinism.

Shortsword out, Antsy picked his way through the litter. It was a large main entrance hall, or gathering chamber. Halls opened off it all around. Stairs led down and up from it on both the right and the left. The stairs were intricately carved, the balusters with vines and blossoms. His light-starved eyes made out much more in the weak light than he knew he could’ve normally; as on a night of a full moon or a fresh snow. In places the floor bore carved designs like grille-work or lattices bearing foliage.

Far off across the chamber the lantern glowed like a star. Next to it Orchid paced restlessly. Antsy found an overturned chest or travel box, its contents of cloth spilled across the floor. He kicked through the dark rich robes. Damn me if I don’t know what’s valuable or not! A Togg-damned waste of time this is.

Something about the nearby stairs caught his attention and he crossed to them. The dust was disturbed here. Not by tracks, but brushed aside, as if disturbed by a wind or the dragging of a wide cloth. He decided to follow as far the light extended. The stairs brought him to a floor just beneath the main one. Here light streamed down through the carvings in the floor above, casting illuminated scenes of bowers of trees across another smooth floor. An intended effect, Antsy wondered? Did lamps or such like burning above cast the same shadows when this place was occupied? He walked out on to the floor.

An object gleamed in the light streaming down. A stick of some kind. Antsy walked up and crouched over it. A bone. A leg bone. A human tibia. And not clean, either. Tangles of ligaments and dried meat still clung to its ends.

He straightened, swallowed the bile churning sickly in his stomach. A dense glow now shone from the far end of the chamber. Fascinated, unable to turn away, he edged closer until the light was sufficient to reveal a carpet of similar remains choking the far side. The shadows of alien blossoms streamed down upon a mass of human carcasses. Many still wore their helmets. Their feet remained in boots. The meat of calf and thigh was gone, as were the viscera from empty gutted chests and abdomens. Ribcages gaped like open mouths hanging with desiccated strips of flesh and meat. Antsy had seen similar remains after battles where scavengers had picked over the dead, taking the choice bits and leaving the rest.

He choked back a yell of alarm and ran for the stairs.

Not looted. Avoided! Everyone else knows better! And Panar sent us here! To our damned deaths.

He came pelting back to Orchid and Corien, who stared, tensing in alarm. ‘What is it?’ Orchid demanded, rising.

‘We have to get out of here — now!’

‘What-’

‘That — thing — everyone was scared of below. I think this is its lair. We have to go.’ He snatched up the lantern, took Corien by the arm. ‘Come on.’

He chivvied them back up the hall to the doors. Here Orchid suddenly let out a cry and froze. Antsy let go of Corien, drew his shortsword. He squinted, seeing nothing. ‘What?’

Hand at mouth, the girl stammered, ‘The door.’

Antsy peered at the doorway anew. What of it? Dark, yes, but … Dark. The light did not penetrate. Something was blocking the entrance, something utterly black like a curtain of night. ‘What is it?’

But Orchid could not speak. She merely jerked her head side to side, appalled, eyes huge.

Shit. Antsy hefted his shortsword. Somehow he didn’t think it would do him much good. And munitions? Probably not them either. He looked to Corien; that finely curled hair now hung down sweat- plastered. The lad met his eye and nodded, hand tightening on his swordgrip.

‘It is a creature of Elder Night,’ said Malakai, stepping out from an alcove next to them. ‘Call it what you will. A daemon, or a fiend. Night animate. No doubt to it we are the invaders, the monsters.’

‘Spare me your sophistry,’ Antsy grated. ‘What can you do against it?’

‘I?’ The man cocked a brow. ‘Nothing. We are trapped. It would seem Panar has the last laugh after all.’

Antsy almost threw his shortsword at the man. ‘Fine,’ he snarled. ‘Everyone back! I’ll try my munitions.’

‘Red …’ Corien warned, touching his arm.

Antsy spun: Orchid had advanced upon the creature.

Shit! ‘Orchid!’

The girl ignored him, or couldn’t hear. One hand was at her throat, the other reaching out as if entreating. She spoke, and Antsy started, for now she uttered another language. One completely unfamiliar to him. Sing-song, it was. Not unpleasant to his ears.

She spoke at length, pausing from time to time as if awaiting an answer. Antsy, Corien and Malakai waited, silent, scarcely breathing.

Despite his anticipation Antsy jerked when a reply came at last. Words murmured from the night, deep and resonating, as if enunciated by all the immeasurable dark surrounding them. Orchid shuddered as if burned — Antsy wondered if she was even more surprised to hear an answer than they. Her breath caught and she looked aside, head bowed as if searching for something, grasping after memories.

Come on … Do it, girl. You can do it …

She nodded then, her gaze distant, and returned her attention to the doorway in front of her. Both hands went to her neck, as if she would throttle herself, and she spoke slowly, haltingly, for some time. The speech ended in a gasp, Orchid wrung out, breathless.

Silence followed. The barrier across the doorway seemed to waver in the lantern light like a wall of hanging velvet. The thing spoke again, a brief response, and Orchid launched into some sort of recitation. Antsy squeezed the grip of his shortsword, his hand wet with sweat. A biting cold now filled the hall. His breath plumed before him.

She finished again with a gasp as if barely able to squeeze out the words. In the silence that followed, Antsy wiped the ice from his hands then examined his fingers: blue and numb with cold. An answer rolled out of the dark: a speech in slow measured tones, a chant almost. The coal-black curtain wavered, then disappeared or slipped away like a shadow exposed to light.

A hissed exhalation escaped Orchid and she would have toppled but for Antsy rushing forward to steady her. He guided her to a bench. Her skirts rattled ice-stiff and rimed with hoar frost. Her skin was burning cold to the touch. Corien sat beside her, holding the lantern close.

‘Malakai …’ Antsy said, gesturing to the entrance.

After a moment the man answered from beyond, ‘It’s gone.’

A distant shout sounded from the darkened halls beyond: a frenzied cry of frustration and rage, and Antsy barked a laugh. ‘So much for Panar’s vengeance. I’m tempted to slit his throat.’

‘No!’ said Orchid, struggling up. Antsy helped her stand. ‘Let’s just go.’

‘And just which way do we go?’ Malakai asked, appearing from the dark.

‘Any way,’ she answered, annoyed. ‘Right. Left. It doesn’t matter. Just find a way up.’

‘Why?’

‘Because what you seek is in the upper levels.’

Malakai froze, astonished. His eyes widened with new appreciation, and he gave a bow of his head — though shallow and tinged by irony. ‘Very well. I will be back shortly.’

Orchid turned to Corien where he slouched on the bench, a hand pressed to his side. She knelt before him. Gently, she set her own hand over his and he hissed at the touch. She spoke again in that same eerie tongue that raised the hairs on the small of Antsy’s neck. It sounded like an invocation or recitation.

A great sigh escaped from Corien and the man would have fallen forward if Antsy hadn’t steadied him. Antsy let him slide down on the bench, unconscious.

‘What was that!’ he demanded, far more harshly than he’d intended. Fear. I’m hearing fear in my voice.