“Don’t make assumptions. I’ve never heard of rooms changing, but there’s always a first time.”
Leonis glowered and then gave a grudging nod. “Very well.”
Together, the pair of them faced the dark doorway and stepped through.
Lianshi met Scorio’s eyes, her own wide, her manner nervous, and they followed right after.
The room beyond was pitch dark but for the thirty, fist-sized circular holes clustered high above with their columns of dusty white light. As before, each column terminated in a perfect circle of illumination the size of a dinner plate, forming a compact island of light in an ocean of dark.
The sight caused the corner of Scorio’s mouth to twitch into a wry smile. He ignited his Heart, saw the translucent flames wreath his spider-cracked core, then sharpened his darkvision.
Immediately the impenetrable, velvety night became insubstantial, and with his Emberling’s widened field of vision, he quickly caught sight of the four fiends. Saw once more their great, bald heads with liver spots mottled across their scalps, ragged holes for noses, and wide, thick-lipped mouths filled with razor-sharp teeth. The four small fiends glared at them with eyes that were little more than beady black gems, and were already creeping toward them, two to a side.
“Hello, you sorry bastards,” rumbled Leonis, swinging Nezzar about with practiced ease that spoke to a lost lifetime of wielding the club. “Let’s try this again, shall we?”
The four fiends paused, taken aback at being so easily detected, and then rushed at them, fangs bared.
And Leonis moved to engage them all.
Nezzar swung through the air in a terrible arc that shattered limbs, sheared through the upper portions of skulls, and crushed all that it touched. Three swings were all it took. Three mighty swings that destroyed the fiends as if they were paper constructions, their bones seemingly as delicate as dried twigs, their black blood spattering in great waves across the floor and walls.
“Damn,” said Lianshi.
Leonis came to a stop, Nezzar extended out to one side, blood sluicing off it as if repelled by the stone, so that almost immediately it was immaculately clean once more, the searing trails left by the burning runes in the dark fading from Scorio’s vision slowly.
“Good work,” said the Nightmare Lady, moving forward with purpose.
Leonis grunted and stared at the crumpled bodies with a complex expression. “I’m the damned Golden King, Wielder of Nezzar, Leonis the Grim—and you better believe I’m going to show this Gauntlet and my ancestors both what I’m made of.” He paused as he drew himself up. “I’ve spent all this time replaying that fight. My death. In my mind it loomed large, but now…?”
“Revenge is never wholly satisfying, my father used to say.” The Nightmare Lady reached the far door and turned back. “But it does have a certain savor. Enjoy it, then put it from your mind. The next chamber is potentially lethal.”
“Potentially?” Lianshi pushed off the iron wall with obvious reluctance. “It was plenty lethal to me the last time.”
“But you’re an Emberling now,” said the Nightmare Lady. “That makes all the difference.”
Together they crossed the chamber, passing through the island of burning white light, and paused before the door.
“One second,” said Scorio. His Heart had burned itself out. “Need to gather some more mana.”
“Take your time,” said Leonis, propping Nezzar upon his shoulder. “We’re in no rush.”
Still, the pause rankled, so Scorio set to refilling his reservoir as quickly as he could. Swept great waves of Coal into his reservoir, packed it in deep, and only when he felt close to saturation did he nod.
One by one they passed into the next chamber. That short, irregularly illuminated hallway ending some twenty yards away in a blank wall. Where Lianshi had died, slashed to ribbons, to bleed out and leave him alone.
Scorio glanced sidelong at Lianshi. She stood, pale-faced, shoulders squared, jaw clenched. Impulsively he reached out with his good hand and took hold of hers, gave it a squeeze. She startled, smiled at him, then turned back to the hall.
The same path of fine gravel led from their door through the six bands of alternating light and darkness. Each band, Scorio now knew, was its own hurdle, the site of exploding blades. Across from them a pair of steps rose to a landing. The illumination was stark, forming six glowing outlines of nested trapezoids.
“Speed and control,” said the Nightmare Lady, stepping down off the platform onto one of the stone shoulders. “Relax, as much as you can, and trust your instincts. Allow yourself to react. You can’t consciously prepare for where the blades will come from, but your Emberling body will guide you if you allow it. Trust it.”
“That’s exactly the kind of advice I hate,” said Leonis, stepping down onto the opposite shoulder. “Care to show us how it’s done?”
The Nightmare Lady’s tail curled, the blade pressing itself between her shoulder blades. “With pleasure. Watch and learn, children.”
“We’re all Emberlings now,” muttered Lianshi. “When is she going to drop the act?”
“When we surpass her, I guess,” said Scorio, but his answer was distracted; he watched, intently, as the Nightmare Lady crouched then burst forward at a run.
She passed the first series of incised whorls in the wall and the blades burst forth. To Scorio’s surprise, they weren’t nearly as blindingly fast as they’d been the first time; he saw them emerge, a horizontal slash and a rising oblique cut, and the Nightmare Lady leaped between them both with neat, clean skill.
And went right into the second. Again the blades flashed forth, and again she evaded them, twisting with admirable skill. She passed through the third, the fourth, the fifth with no difficulty, then paused to regain her balance. Faced the sixth and last set of blades, and with a sharp cry of defiance dove forth again, to slide just under the scything attack and emerge unharmed on the far side.
“Damn,” said Leonis. Nezzar faded from his grip, and he rubbed both his palms on his hips. “She makes it look easy.”
“Relax,” called Naomi, dropping her nightmarish form and allowing her Heart to gutter out. “Trust your instincts. Let your reflexes guide you.”
“Yeah, yeah,” muttered Leonis, lowering himself into a crouch. “I’m built for love, not this nimble nonsense.”
“Luck,” called Lianshi, and then Leonis took off, a lumbering run that propelled him right into the first set of blades. They burst forth, and Leonis let out a concerned cry as he contorted himself, hopped his feet up so the blades passed beneath him. Staggered as he landed on the far side and drew himself up short.
“One down,” he said, wiping at his brow.
Lianshi raised a clenched fist. “Good work!”
Again Leonis charged forward, and again the blades flashed forth. Had they really slowed down so much? The first time they’d been impossible to track, but now Scorio could watch them emerge with just enough warning to see how they’d slash forth.
Leonis could obviously see the same, and though he was far clumsier than the Nightmare Lady, he dodged them as best he could, avoiding any major wounds but suffering from some five or so lacerations by the time he reached the far end, one of which was worryingly deep across the side of his thigh.
“Damn it,” hissed the large man, tearing the lower half of one of his flowing pant legs away to form a tourniquet. “Damn it to hell.”
“Here I go!” Without further warning, Lianshi darted forth, her face a mask of barely controlled panic. Scorio felt her Heart ignite as she ran and could only marvel at her grace. Where the Nightmare Lady had been all lethal control, Lianshi was a leaf being wafted by a breeze, dancing between branches of a tree as it fell and touching none of them. Almost effortlessly she ran and leaped, past the first, the second, the third.
Scorio was grinning, admiring her poise and dexterity when her foot slipped as she emerged through the fourth. With a cry she flailed her arms, then plunged headfirst into the fifth set of blades, all control lost.