The two columns cast deeper shadows across their path like black lines drawn in the dust. Beyond the shadows the veil gradually lifted away, and the ruins of the secret repository loomed all around them, coming into view like the rise of mountains through the mist. Broken stones thrust through the sands, swept clean in places by the wind. Ancient carvings of runes covered the sides of the larger blocks, marking this as a place of great Vizjerei power. Cain felt his heartbeat quicken, the palms of his hands growing moist. He could feel it thrumming beneath his feet, deep within the earth.
Or perhaps, he thought, he felt something else.
There was darkness here. Although the sun still touched the tops of these rocks, it did not warm them. Even the paladin sensed it now, his steps faltering as they moved deeper into the ruins. Before them lay the remains of the temple, its entrance covered in rubble, what was left of the roof all but collapsed upon itself. Massive timbers reached toward the sky like the ribs of a giant beast. This was where the ancient texts would have been kept, if they had existed at all. But it would be dangerous inside, possibly unstable.
A sound reached their ears like the rustling of leaves. Akarat stopped and drew his sword. “Do you hear it?” he asked. His voice was quiet.
Cain nodded, stepping to the young man’s side. “There may be something else here with us, after all,” he said.
“Like . . . what? An animal?”
“Perhaps,” Cain said. He could tell that the paladin was both scared and excited, and trying hard not to show it. Stories of demonic attacks were one thing, but actually facing something most people thought was only a legend was another. Cain knew that all too well.
The sounds swirled faintly around them, almost fading away before returning again like waves on a beach or the hushed muttering of a crowd. A curious prickling sensation warming his skin, Cain held his staff like a talisman as he moved ahead on the broken path, Akarat close behind. “Close your ears,” Cain said, “as if you were deaf. Should you hear voices, do not listen to them.”
“I don’t understand—”
“If something foul is present, it will try to corrupt you, find your weaknesses. Ignore anything it tries to say. Whatever it is, I promise you are not meant to hear it.”
He reached the edge of the tumbled rocks at the entrance to the temple and peered around them, looking for a way in. There was a space just large enough for a man. Darkness loomed beyond the narrow passage that was the height of his shoulders. Cain swung his rucksack down again and found a crumbling spellbook, searching the brittle pages for the right words. As he said them aloud, the glass sphere at the end of his staff came to life, taking on a blue glow and lighting the space within.
Beyond the reach of the wind, where the sand began to fade, the drifts held the faint impression of a footprint. Either a man, or something that walked like one, had passed through this place not long ago.
He tucked the book away and turned to the paladin, who stared at him and the glowing staff and back again, mouth agape.
“Magic? True magic?”
“A simple spell, nothing more. Like the looking glass, held within the objects themselves. I simply have the knowledge to unlock it. This is a place of sorcery, chosen, at least in part, because of the power in the soil. A spell is more useful in a spot like this.”
“Are you really the last of the Horadrim?”
Cain considered how to answer. “What I learned, I learned from books,” he said finally. “It’s a forgotten order. If there were any others left, they would surely be more prepared than I am, and would have made themselves known by now.”
“So if you are the last, what then?”
“I must do what I can to stop what is coming to Sanctuary.” Cain shrugged. “And pray it is not too late.” And may the Heavens help us all, he thought, but did not say it.
Akarat glanced to his right and left, as if waiting for something to pounce. “There is much of this world still to know,” he said. At that moment he looked like a boy who had just walked in on something he shouldn’t have seen and was trying to make sense of it. He hadn’t noticed the footprint.
Cain put his hand on Akarat’s shoulder. “Have you ever been in battle?”
“I—I’ve fought many times,” the paladin said. “I’ve patrolled the city, and in the ring I’ve proven my skill—”
“Not in training, or on patrol,” Cain said gently, “but against those who would run you through, if given half the chance. Or worse.”
Akarat shook his head, his eagerness betraying his attempt to appear more confident. “There have not been many opportunities since I came of age.”
“I forget that. The battle on Mount Arreat occurred years ago. You would have been no older than . . .”
“Ten years,” Akarat said, his eyes bright. “I remember hearing the stories from the men who returned. I wanted to be like them.”
“There’s no shame in that.” Cain smiled. “The world has been calmer, at least on the surface, since then. But it will give you an opportunity soon. For now, I want you to guard this entrance.” When the young man started to protest, he shook his head. “I am an old man, not very strong. I cannot fight with a sword. But I am not wearing armor, and I’m slender enough to squeeze through these smaller spaces and find something that may help us, if given the time to do so. You’ll do me far more good out here, making sure nothing can surprise me from behind.”
Akarat set his feet and took the hilt of his sword with both hands. “I won’t let you down,” he said.
Cain smiled, but when he turned back toward the darkness, the smile faded. Again he was reminded of the hero whom he had once known in Tristram as King Leoric’s oldest son, and who had later been known as the Dark Wanderer. He had said much the same thing before descending into the depths of those cursed caverns beneath the cathedral. Cain had tutored the boy himself and had loved him—at least, as much as he had been capable of love, back then.
He ducked his head to enter the makeshift passage. Inside the narrow space, the height required him to shuffle forward with his shoulders slumped and knees bent, turning sideways to slip through a tight spot as the rock brushed against him. The pain bit into his back again, an invisible and constant enemy.
Perhaps I shouldn’t have come in myself, he thought. Perhaps this is a younger man’s task, after all.
But only a few feet farther in, the makeshift passage opened up and dropped away. He held up his glowing staff to see more clearly. A set of rough-hewn stone steps led down into the earth. They were in good shape; the lower levels of the temple had apparently survived the building’s collapse. More footprints marked the dust, several going up and down. It was impossible to know how long they had been there.
The smell of mold and dust drifted up to him, like something from a tomb that had been opened up after many centuries. He heard the faint rustling again and peered into the deeper blackness, but saw nothing.
Deckard Cain descended slowly, the air growing much colder as he went. The stairs ended in a stone floor. His light revealed a large chamber supported by massive wooden beams and strung with thick cobwebs. There were runes of both power and warning carved into the beams. Cain read them with increasing apprehension. These were the marks of the followers of Bartuc, a Vizjerei mage who had lived many centuries before and had been corrupted and overcome by bloodlust after summoning demons to do his bidding. His clashes with his brother, Horazon, had been the climax of the ancient Mage Clan Wars and led to the deaths of many thousands of people.
If this had been a repository for Bartuc’s army, whatever Vizjerei artifacts he found here would be infused with demonic magic. They would be suspect at best, and possibly very dangerous.
Had they made a terrible mistake, coming here?