Descent into the Depths of the Earth

“Clan Nightshade are outsiders! They are not of the body!”

“Then we need ties.” Faen turned away. “A means of welcomingthem truly back into the family of faerie.”

“It cannot be done!”

“It must be done. The council meets before the QueenTitania tomorrow. I shall propose exactly this: that Nightshade be brought back from its exile in the wilds.”

Ushan flexed his fists only to feel Faen’s voice derisivelycaressing his rage.

“Truly, Ushan, turn your intelligence to the task. A new ageis being born! Faerie must survive it.” Lord Faen rose into the air. “We needtools, Ushan. We need weapons.”

The faerie scholar faded into invisibility and then departed. Left alone with his serving girls, Lord Ushan sat in stony silence. In the crater below, Tarquil wiped his blade above his kill and looked up to meet his uncle’s eyes. His thin mouth twisted into a smile.

1

Autumn had stripped the maple trees of their green leaves,carpeting the forest in a deep, damp carpet of flame red and russet brown. The smell of damp and mold was everywhere, strangely fresh and enervating.

A man dressed in armor made of black dragon scales plodded silently along the road that meandered through the trees. A shimmering black hell hound pelt hung down his back, the canine’s head sitting atop the man’shelmet and grinning madly with bright white fangs. The man’s hand rested upon ahuge sword that jutted through his belt. Heavy hiking boots, a backpack, a coil of rope… it was the equipment of a man who marched fast and slept rough.Shaven headed, powerful, and suspicious, the Justicar marched his tireless march, his eyes watching the forest for the slightest stir of life.

Hovering gaily in mid air beside him, wearing an outfit to make a mother scream and a father reach for weapons, Escalla the faerie whistled a tune. Two feet tall, her long blonde hair shining straight and free, the faerie travelled without a worry in the world.

Along the road behind them rumbled a mule cart driven by a little man with an axe-beak nose. On the cart hung a banner reading: TRANSPORTS TO ADVENCHER. Polk the teamster drew in deep breaths of satisfaction as he looked about, as if the forest were a personal construction project in which he took huge pride. Beside the cart padded Enid the sphinx-brown haired, smotheredin freckles, and enjoying the dappled forest sun immensely.

They followed an old overgrown road lined occasionally with the heads of sunken statues, the granite faces of ancient kings frowning down at the travelers. Sparing the statues a brief glare of annoyance, the Justicar adjusted the fit of his hell hound and gave a seething growl.

Their road map had finally been found. Polk had been using it as a wrapper for a greasy pile of ham sandwiches. As it turned out, their destination, Hommlet, was not in Keoland as Polk had claimed. Instead it lay three hundred miles to the northeast. Jus was lost, bruised, battered, and had almost been eaten by a hydra a few miles back. This was not one of his better days. Nursing righteous indignation, Jus shot a dire glance back at Polk where he rode upon the wagon.

“Keoland indeed!”

Happy as a clam, Escalla simply shrugged and said, “Get offhis case! So he got the map upside down. It’s the Flanaess! With these kind ofplace names, anyone can make mistakes.” Escalla happily fluttered her wings.“We’ll just go north for a few hundred miles and bam! We’ll be inHommlet.”

Unperturbed by the detour, Escalla, Polk, and Enid simply seemed to look forward to the journey and enjoyed the views. More concerned with safety, food, shelter, and keeping his companions alive, the Justicar looked about the forest and seethed.

“Keoland. I’ve never been to Keoland before.”

“Well, these autumn leaves are neat.” Flying backward,Escalla plucked at a huge red maple leaf. “Feels kind of homey, like I’ve beenhere before.”

The fact that they were totally lost had made no impression on her. Jus looked at her with one raised brow and asked, “Have you beenhere before?”

“Ah, I dunno. Trees… yeah. Leaves… yeah. One patch offorest is really pretty amazingly like another.” Escalla turned around in midairas she flew. “But this”-she gestured at the slowly crumbling remains of a longfallen statue-“this could be familiar! I know I’ve seen statues like thissomewhere before. I mean kinda similar…” She darted forward down the road.“Hey! I know! Let’s follow the road! It must lead to a town!”

“Escalla, we are following the road.”

“Oh. Hoopy!”

The road turned a bend, and a row of thatched roofs suddenly met the travelers’ eyes. It was a village long deserted and left to the weeds.In a wilderness of deserted buildings, only the squirrels reigned. Cottage doors hung open, some creaking slowly like the sagging bones of the dead. Other houses simply lay cold and empty with thistles sprouting from the thatch roofs. The squirrels sped and flitted from roof to roof, wall to wall, perching atop rusted wagons and twittering atop abandoned ploughs. They even perched on the faded sign of an old tavern, making the painted boards sway slowly in the wind.

War had come and gone. The village lay abandoned, the inhabitants having been wise enough to retreat before powers they could not resist. The buildings were still intact but were now home to only an occasional nest of stirges.

As Enid padded her way down the weed-ridden street, Polk the teamster reined the cart to a halt. The sudden silence was deafening.

Grim and tired, the Justicar plodded over to the tavern and prodded the door open with his black sword. The gloomy taproom was deserted, all except for a family of voles.

“Cinders?”

The hell hound searched with senses far sharper than any mortal’s. Stirges, tree hoppers, moss, mold, mouses with tailses, rainpuddles, little spiders.

“No movement?”

No monsters, no magic.

Jus knelt to carefully examine the street. The hard-packed earth was carpeted with weeds, none of which seemed bent or broken by the passing of feet. “And no tracks.”

“Hey! Look at this! It’s a dead elephant!” Escalla hoveredover a broken cottage. “Wow! Ivory! We could find a fortune in ivory!”

Jus walked over to the girl and looked at a row of crushed and shattered houses. Lying sprawled amongst the fallen walls was a huge skeleton easily three times the size of a man. The skeleton’s feet were wrappedin moldering boots. A tree limb had served it for a club. It lay long dead, furred with moss, and with dandelions growing from the sockets of its eyes.

Escalla darted above the houses and rubbed her hands in glee. “There’s another elephant over here! And another!”

“They’re not elephants, Escalla. They’re giants.”

“How do you know?”

“A remarkable lack of elephant-like properties.” Jus levereda flaking piece of bone from the top of a giant’s shin and passed it up toCinders. “I judge them about sixteen feet tall. They must have driven off thevillagers.”

Sitting on a rooftop, Escalla went into a sulk. “Well, theycould have been elephants.”

“Escalla, there are no elephants in the Flanaess.”

“How do you know?”