They had confronted the wraith together once before. If he could hold it, she could burn it, but obviously that had not lasted the first time. Remaining hidden still offered the better chance of uncovering her purpose.
Without warning, the wraith began moving again. It drifted back into a passage on the cavern’s southern side. Within the span of a few breaths, Ghassan heard voices coming, and his gaze locked on the great northern archway.
Wynn stepped into a massive cavern, and her gaze slowly rose into the heights.
The dome’s sheer size and the level of destruction were overwhelming. Her companions were equally stunned. Even Ore-Locks turned in a circle, as if trying to take in everything at once. How could this enormous place not have collapsed when the mountain fell?
Chane and Shade kept close to her as they moved inward. Wynn was so mesmerized that she stepped over piles of shattered debris without seeing them.
“Look,” Chane said, pointing down. “These are better preserved.”
Not catching his meaning, Wynn glanced down.
Thick skeletal remains lay to her right, half-covered in remnants of decaying armor and corroded blades exposed by rotted sheaths. One still wore an ax on his back, and a tarnished thôrhk lay among the shattered bones of his neck. Another skeleton, perhaps a woman, lay a few paces ahead, her bones still bearing a ring with a dark blue stone and a necklace of metal loops.
As when Wynn had walked the long tunnel from the cave-in, she suffered a returning sense of loss and sorrow. The scale of death here was too much to hold in her thoughts for long, and she wondered what Ore-Locks felt—thought—standing amid what his genocidal ancestor had done here.
Did he feel anything? He appeared merely entranced by the daunting visage of this lost city of his people’s forebears.
Wynn couldn’t help asking, “How can this be intact if the entire upper peak collapsed?”
Still gazing upward, Ore-Locks answered, “We are deep ... much deeper than I realized. Thousands must have lived here, but why would so many choose to live this far down?”
Chane started to speak, but Wynn held up a hand to stop him. Ore-Locks wasn’t looking at either of them, as if he’d forgotten their existence. For once, his guard was down as he absorbed the mysteries here. She wanted to hear more from him.
“They must have excavated deeply between levels,” he went on. “So deep that the stone between them helped shield the lowest levels. The peaks on either side may have dispersed some of the downward force.” His voice became almost too quiet to hear. “But whatever happened shook the entire mountain.”
Wynn began to feel ill. None of his speculations changed anything. Pushing away the horrors of a forgotten time, she focused on her purpose in coming here. There was an orb to be found, but where would it be hidden in a place of this size?
As far down as they were, she believed the orb would have been placed even deeper—at the lowest place possible. How were they to find a way down in this much destruction?
Chane had crouched, examining the skeleton with the ax and the thôrhk; it was an odd, morbid sight watching his passive and silent study. Before she could call him away, he whispered to himself.
“The ends are not spiked ... this was not a thänæ under one of the warrior Eternals.”
His eyes turned to the ax, and his brow wrinkled. For a moment, Wynn was startled that he even pondered such things, but her own curiosity was piqued.
“Are there marks on its end knobs?” she asked. “If so, can you make them out?”
Chane looked back to the heavy thôrhk’s two open ends. “They are too blemished, tarnished. But it does have end knobs, rather than being plain and unadorned.”
Wynn looked at him in surprise. Only one type of thôrhk for one of the Bäynæ, the Eternals, had no end knobs of any kind. It was the one given to those honored under Bedzâ’kenge—Feather-Tongue. Although she knew of this practice, she had never seen a thänæ who wore such in her few visits to Dhredze Seatt. How had Chane ever learned such a thing?
Wynn started slightly when she realized Ore-Locks was watching her.
Straightening, she said, “We need to go lower.”
He glanced away, and then he nodded and took the lead, heading south. “In Old Seatt, for my own people, the underways have tunnels out of places like this. Those headed north led to upward connections, while those to the south led to downward ones.”
Wynn blinked. She’d never heard nor read such a thing. Then again, she’d seen nothing of Old Seatt besides its surface atop the mountain that held all of Dhredze Seatt. The newer settlements, like Bay-Side and Sea-Side, had spiral tunnels at the end of all mainways leading both up and down.
Motioning to Chane and Shade, Wynn hurried after Ore-Locks. For once, the dwarf might be truly useful. It bothered her that she was forced to follow someone with his hidden agenda, who could walk through stone and was a potential puppet of some traitorous ancestral spirit.
But it didn’t bother her enough to stop her. It didn’t even slow her down. She had to find the orb.
Ore-Locks headed into a large tunnel in the center of the south wall.
“You think this is the best tunnel?” she asked.
He half turned. “It leads down.”
“Wait,” Chane called, and began pulling blankets, canvas bags, and water skins from his back to pile them on the floor.
“What are you doing?” Wynn asked. “Those are all our supplies.”
“I will bring some food and one water skin,” he replied. “But I need to be able to move more freely, for whatever we encounter. We can retrieve all of this on our way out.”
She was tempted to argue, but realized he was right. He kept both his own packs, but their weight was nothing to him. Ore-Locks waited and watched until Chane was ready, and then he headed onward.
Without hesitation, Wynn followed into the broad tunnel.
Still crouched behind the crumbled stairwell, Ghassan had watched Wynn and her companions enter the cavern. Even from a distance, the sight of her surprised him. She looked different, almost beyond travel worn. Her oval face was thinner than when he had last seen her, and she moved so surely, easily scrambling over loose debris. Not once did she accept assistance offered from Chane.
Ghassan remembered Chane and Shade well. In spite of himself, he had some respect for Wynn’s choice of protectors. Ghassan had fought beside the undead and the dog. They were both formidable. The presence of the dwarf, however, made little sense.
Had Wynn hired him as a guide? That seemed unlikely, as this place was well more than a thousand years old.
As the four came closer and passed by, Ghassan studied the dwarf, thinking he bore a resemblance to Domin High-Tower. But where High-Tower was visibly aged, even for a dwarf, the one leading Wynn looked much younger, not as thick, and was clean-shaven ... or at least had been before this journey.
Too many unknown variables convinced Ghassan that he should remain hidden, follow behind, and yet still shield Wynn from the wraith. At present, he did not believe the black spirit would harm her if it had followed her this far.
Soon he lost sight of Wynn’s group as they entered a southern archway. He was forced to creep after, staying out of their awareness. But he struggled with indecision. He could not expose himself to the wraith, so he couldn’t follow Wynn yet and let that creature come behind him. And still, he had no desire to lose track of her now that she had finally arrived.
The wraith drifted out from its hiding place.
The folds of its immaterial black robe shifted in the still air, even as it lingered near the passage Wynn had entered. It waited a long while before suddenly vanishing into the same wide and tall opening.