Chapter 24

The three men retraced their steps through the laboratory. Ezza looked longingly at the scalpel but Aden urged him to keep walking, promising that if they survived, they would return to retrieve the ancient instrument. Reluctantly, Ezza allowed himself to be led away.

In the doorway, the three men were straining to pull door back into the frame. The weight and the inertia worked against them as their feet slipped and slid, as they attempted to give themselves more leverage. “It’s almost as if someone is supposed to stay on the other side and push,” Ezza said. “O dear gods, is that what they expected, that someone was always in the room?”

“Maybe his wizardship could put his mind to the task and use his wizardly zappity zap zap, we could close the door,” Qasi said between grunts and groans.

“Oh,” Aden said, feeling like a fool. He gathered his focus and sent tendrils behind the door, where he found three focal points. With a mental push that felt like slamming his body against a rock wall, he hit all three points. The door began to close without a sound or any indication of mechanical intervention.

When the door slid firmly into the frame, Ezza grabbed the wheel and turned it counter-wise. Everyone felt the bolts shoot into the walls and the floor. As the quiver in the floor dissipated, a strong wind suddenly sucked away all the air at their backs.

The wall behind them next to the staircase had disappeared. A gapping maw of a tunnel stood in its place. The sides of the tunnel appeared to roughly cut and chiseled stone, but light from the basement landing lit only a few feet into the passageway.

“Secrets upon secrets,” Ezza said, shaking his head in disbelief.

“The back door,” Aden said. “The back door no one knows exists, and it heads away from the harbor.”

“I don’t like it,” Qasi said. “The laboratory was bad enough and we were expecting that room. This one, popping out of a blank wall that I leaned against when it was solid, gives me the spooks.”

Aden took a deep ragged breath and forced his shoulders to drop. When the newest wave of panic subsided, he looked up into Ezza’s face. His eyes were narrowed, and his mouth was pinched. With another loss of words Aden said, “Well?”

Ezza nodded his head and looked down at the floor. Using the toe of his boot, he traced a quick sliver of a moon and next to it, three lines bisecting each other in the middle. “By the moon and the stars, the tunnel leads us in the wrong direction. We’ve already been down here half a day, which is cutting things close. First, you’re the only wizard, you signed for the only weapon and only you can wield it. Second, you been preaching like a priest that people come first and well, there are a lot of people in this city including my kin and comrades. I mean to say, if there is something in the king’s crypt, the only thing between it and them is you, me and Qasi. I cannot detour from my duty, Aden.”

“I’m not making good decisions,” Aden said. “The sharpness of mind is dulled, and the focus is askew. I could always trust myself with these skills at my beck and call until now. What should be clear and precise is a jumbled mess in my head.”

“It’s called the fog of war,” Ezza said. “Generals surround themselves with staff while captains have their lieutenants because events roll ever faster, and details explode beyond counting. No one can stay on top of the decisions to be made without help.”

“Most unpleasant,” Aden said, relieved that he was not losing his mind. “Qasi?”

“Harbor, your wizardship,” Qasi said. “If we survive, I’d be pleased to stick my nose down that dark hole.”

Aden nodded and beckoned the two men to follow him up the stairs. He slid his sword into his new sheath and belted it around his waist. With a casual glance at the weapons in their racks, Aden strode out the door into the afternoon sun, locking the door and sealing the ward with his key. He watched Ezza take a coin from his pocket and give to a child in scraggily clothes with instructions. The child ran down towards the harbor.

“Lead the way,” Aden said, doing his best to ignore the stares. Looking up, he grimaced at the thin white thread of smoke that reached ever higher into the sky. The longer he looked, the more substantial the smoke became, more solid. “Never in my life...”

He looked back down, making sure that he did not trip on anything that would send him embarrassingly tumbling down the lane. The last battle he had fought had been a disaster. Brule fought without rules and with a ruthlessness that Aden was unaware existed within the practitioner’s realm. The lesson was learned, and Aden was marching down to the water to face a dead king’s crypt without a clue of what he would find or what rules if any, circumstances would dictate.

The laboratory had shown him much more than he realized during his exploration of the room. Everything, even the swords, were within the realm of sciences. Jewels could be manufactured with the correct ingredients, heat, and pressure, a delightfully normal and recognizable process. Few in Aden’s old world produced such things but the tools were still there, if one had the patience and inclination to learn and to practice. The ones Aden had seen before were simply half the size and not near so symmetrical. The art had not been lost, but many of the more difficult to master aspects had been abandoned.

Aden tilted his head to consider. The world felt as if it had been abandoned. Surely some knowledge and processes had been lost by circumstance, but such events were accidents. The world about him did not feel accidental as much as willfully put down and ignored, like a child’s toy after years of play. Ancient walls still stood but little effort had been exerted to expand them or lengthen them. People patched the holes and resealed the cracks as they appeared, but not much else.

He tilted his head to the other side. He had abandoned himself as well, he decided. Losing his entire life, including temple and friends was a fine excuse for many people, but such loss was not a reason with which he could live. He had held himself to a higher standard and when the worst of the worst happened, he all too eagerly tossed away the raised bar.

Zaya had been right and he had been wrong. He sucked in both cheeks, pursing his lips. Releasing his skin clenched in his teeth, he let the melancholy thoughts go with a gust of breath. Should he live to see the day, he would ask her forgiveness. Until then, he had a meeting to attend.

He chuckled at his own joke, a meeting. Qasi gave him a quizzical look for a moment. The three continued further down towards the harbor. The water disappeared from view as they marched through the warehouse district, which just a day ago had been a dangerous place, even in the daylight. The roads were nearly empty today and the few people in the street were strolling almost carelessly.