“I knew many sorcerers in this district—and philosophers, too. Some of them were close to my age, and some of them stayed to die with the city. Maybe we can stir up a spirit or two, little elf-fish. Let’s do a little looking here.”
He dived toward a dark shape, a narrow three- or four-story place that looked simple compared to its neighbors. As they got closer Feril could tell it wasn’t so much a building, as a tree. The place had been fashioned out of the trunk of a giant ebonwood, with doors and windows carved into it and a tile roof laid across the top. Colorful carved bricks rose up one side of the tree, likely more for design than for stability. However, age and the lake were taking their toll—she could see where the wood was rotting at the base and midway up.
“I’d say we should go in the front door. The polite thing to do and all. Join me?” Obelia didn’t wait for her response. He floated through a door that Feril had to struggle to open.
By the time she had tugged it open, she could see no trace of Obelia. There was only an empty room which looked like the inside of a hollow tree. The floor was gravel, and there was no furniture, but at the back of the room there was a rotting wooden ladder that led to a room above and another below. Feril hovered by the ladder, her enchanted light revealing a cavernous lower floor that was filled with scroll tubes and colorful glass flasks, most of them intact. She started to head down but heard a musical sound from above, Obelia’s sigh. She reluctantly pulled herself up into a room filled with numerous elf spirits.
“Join us,” said a reed-thin apparition.
Feril felt a chill as she spun to go back.
“Don’t leave, elf-fish.” Obelia said, cocking his head bemusedly, his diaphanous eyebrows raised. “I thought you wanted help with your dragon problem.”
Feril clung to the ladder, looking up at the ghostlike face of an aged elf standing close to Obelia and peering curiously down at her.
“This is Kalilnama,” Obelia continued, nodding toward the thin ghost. “His wife was a fine sorceress. She left him when the dwarves led our people from the city, hut he stayed.”
So he stayed and died, Feril thought. She was growing cold again, and she wrapped her fingers tightly around one of the ladder rungs. I’m getting cold, Obelia. I have to leave, go back to the surface and get warm, recover my strength.
“Yes, he stayed, little elf-fish. He could not leave all his books and scrolls…his life’s work.”
The cold surrounded her, and the room above grew darker, the ghosts ever more transparent.
“He studied dragons. For more than a hundred years, elf-fish.” Obelia’s fingers were twirling in the water, and motes of saffron and green were appearing. Globes of warmth formed around his hands then sped toward Feril. “Oh, here. I almost forgot. We don’t want you getting all frozen again…”
Let me tell you all about Dhamon Grimwulf, Feril thought, after the cold was banished again.
Kalilnama glided closer as Feril repeated Dhamon’s saga, with Obelia chipping in comments and things she forgot to mention. The other ghosts crowded in a little closer, peering at her and murmuring amongst themselves.
The thin ghost named Kalilnama was enraptured by Feril’s story, and more than once he excitedly wrung his hands, the fingers passing through each other. When she was finished, Kalilnama asked questions so fast that Feril’s answers blurred together.
“Were I alive!” he cried, his voice thin and high-pitched. “To touch this creature you speak of, a dragon who was once a human. Such a thing has never before lived.”
“Kalilnama knew Beryl was coming.” Obelia was at Feril’s shoulder, his words musical whispers in her ear. “He predicted the great bloated beast would destroy everything.”
“But I stayed,” Kalilnama said. “I thought we might find safety in the catacombs.”
“He drowned there,” Obelia said matter-of-factly. He waved an arm at the other hovering spirits. “The others drowned with him; some of them were his students, some were elves from the outskirts of the city who had fled here for protection.” The ghost gave a laugh that sent goosebumps down Feril’s back.
There was a reverent look on Kalilnama’s insubstantial face. “The dragon was evil, but a truly magnificent creature to behold. I’m glad I stayed, if only to glimpse her. I’d never seen an overlord before, and I thought to record everything about her.” He wrung his hands together again, sadly shaking his head.
Can you help Dhamon? Feril floated face to face with Kalilnama.
The ghost grew thinner, folding in upon itself until it looked like a sheet of parchment, then thinner still, until he was a mere wisp of white rising from the floor. “A dragon scale turned him into what he is now. Perhaps the magic in dragon scales can undo this terrible thing. Your friend’s own scales would not work, of course—you would need unspoiled magic to break the old magic that remade him, and very powerful magic, naturally—so the scale of a greater dragon is my guess. That makes it all the more difficult. I have notes in the catacombs, sealed in scroll tubes that keep the water at bay. They are yours.”
His airy form flowed down the ladder and into the room far below. Feril and Obelia followed him, while the roomful of ghosts watched them go.
Kalilnama, what kind of dragon would have such scales? Feril prompted.
“We’ll work on this mystery together,” Kalilnama was quick to return. “I hate to say it, but I think a scale from an overlord would provide the best chance for success.”
“Hmmm. Beryl’s corpse is not far away,” Obelia suggested. “Perhaps that is the cure in the lake that your friend is looking for.”
Feril pictured the green carcass and the ghostly Knights of Neraka that hovered around it. She shuddered and felt something tighten around her heart.
9
This time Dhamon swam farther out, diving and surfacing, until finally he caught sight of the edge of the sunken city. His eyes widened at the sight.
He circled above a tall building. He was surprised it seemed so well preserved, looking almost as though it were purposely built on the deep bottom of this lake. The bones, bits of armor, and possessions he could see strewn below on sidewalks clearly marked this place as an abandoned graveyard.
Wispy ghosts of elves spotted him and hid in doorways and pressed against walls. Though no longer alive, they still feared dragons, and they recalled all too vividly how Beryl brought about the death of their beloved Qualinost.
Circling widely, Dhamon also spotted the horns of Beryl’s carcass but did not swim close, especially because the overlord was mired in the depths. He swam and searched for hours before feeling the old anxiety and tightening in his chest. Then he returned to the surface, gulping in air and relishing the warmth.
Three days went by without any sign of Feril. Three days of Ragh’s griping and repeated entreaties to leave. Three days before Dhamon decided to risk another swim farther out and deeper down into the Lake of Death.
It was the afternoon of the third day since Feril had dived into the lake, and on that day Feril returned, just as Dhamon approached the sunken city from above. With tremendous relief he spotted her swimming in a straight line toward the surface. He shot up, surfacing not far away, and followed her to the shore.
“Dhamon! You’re shivering! You’ve been in the lake looking for me? Isn’t that…sweet. Ack, but you smell even worse when you’re wet. Move away!”
He gave a nod of his massive head, water dripping off his scales. Wet, they shone almost brilliantly in the setting sun. “Three days you’ve been gone. I feared you had drowned,” he rumbled ruefully. Ragh was plodding toward them.
She ran her fingers through her hair and stretched in the fading sunlight. “I was fine, Dhamon Grimwulf. You know I can well take care of myself.” A pause, then: “In truth I didn’t realize so much time had passed.” She wondered how long she’d been unconscious in the tower room before Obelia warmed her. “Elves do not have to sleep very much, you know, though I am terribly hungry.” She offered him a wistful smile, showing she appreciated his concern.