Chapter 24 - Trial By Fire

  5 months and two weeks Earlier

  The fire gushed down over Sidon and Chell, flowing over and around them as it hit the barrier and coated the dome. It obscured them from view and scorched the ground all around them. When it finally stopped a few moments later Sidian and Chell reappeared, the wizard looked around in terror, though he was perfectly fine, his shield had completely blocked the entire attack. He dropped the barrier, seemingly unable to keep it up any longer.

  Chell looked over at him and then around at the floor before looking back at Cal and Leni. “I think the traps all have multiple triggers.” She noted, climbing back to her feet and stepping around Sidian. “I’ll go on ahead and see what else I find.”

  “Wait.” Leni said, frowning and jogging to catch up. Cal joined her, aware that he was the only one with light. “I hear the faint sound of running water. Like a river.”

  Chell frowned and looked up the passage before disappearing. They moved back into their formation and followed her. After Sidian’s scare he was much more careful where he stepped, and so was Cal. He didn’t have an eye for traps like Chell and even she missed that one.

  It felt like they walked for another hour or so by the light of Cal’s blade, listening to Chell’s commentary and disarming traps as the sounds of a rushing river grew louder. Finally they found Chell again standing at the edge of a cliff. They could hear the river, but they couldn’t see it, it was too dark.

  “How far down is it?” Cal asked.

  “About thirty meters.” She said. “It rushes off that way.” She pointed to the left. “I think that’s away from the city, not even towards the Bisect river.”

  Cal nodded.

  “Where to then? This can’t be the end, can it?” Leni asked, trying to peer down into the crevasse.

  Chell shook her head. “There’s another cliff opposite, with a door. I think this is where the passage is supposed to lead to.” She said. “I think that’s the tomb.”

  Frowning, Cal tried to squint in order to see what was across the river, but he couldn’t see anything. “Is there… hey is there a brazier or a torch or something over there?” he asked after a long moment. Chell frowned and nodded. “Okay, okay, do you think it has any fuel in it? And do you think you could guide me to throw fire at it?”

  “Ah…” Chell muttered, understanding. “Put out your sword, I can’t see so well with it lit up.”

  Cal nodded and did so, dropping everyone into pitch black. There was a moment of vertigo and he almost fell over, another moment of sudden distrust when he thought that Leni might just throw him into the river, but then he settled down.

  “Okay. There does seem to be something in the Brazier. Might as well try a shot.” Chell said and Cal felt her move in close to him, her back to his front. “You’re going to fire a flame bullet?”

  “Yeah.” Cal agreed, his heart suddenly racing as the feyling pressed in close to him. He raised his hands in front of him, left hand on his right wrist and right hand open with his palm out.

  “Great, you want to go a little up and a little to the right.” Cal adjusted and then felt her little hand on his chest. She patted. “Fire.”

  He did so, pouring will into the space in front of his hand. There was a flash of light and for a moment he and Chell were illuminated, then the bolt of fire - about the size of Cal’s fist with a long trail - shot across the river and slammed into the floor, but he got a brief image of the brazier before the fire went out, it was barely thirty centimetres above where he’d hit. The arc of the fire just hadn’t been strong enough. He raised his hand an inch, imagining where the brazier was.

  “You got this.” Chell said and Cal fired again.

  Will poured into his outstretched hand and the bolt of fire flew across the river again, faster than an arrow, but slower than a crossbow bolt. It arced over the gap, not illuminating anything on the way until it hit home in the brazier. The metal cage burst alight and illuminated a surprising amount of the area.

  “Yes!” Cal exclaimed and Chell hopped out from practically being in his embrace. She turned back to high five him. He slapped her hand and grinned, looking around at the area.

  They were in a large cave with a river running very quickly below them. Spikes stuck up out of the water, ready to kill any who fell in. Across the other side of the river was a small platform, a brazier and a door.

  The wall around the door was made of solid gold that faded away the further from the door it got. The frame of the door, a golden archway, was covered in what looked like a combination of rubies and other gems like Garnet and jasper.

  The door itself appeared to be made of a mixture of bronze, copper and gold, their subtle differences looking like the pattern of fire. In fact if Cal squinted he was fairly sure there were flame carvings covering not only the door by the doorway as well. Finally at the centre of the door was a keyhole. The kind that took keys as big as a troll finger.

  “Great…” Leni said. “Now we can see where we can’t get to and what’s probably going to kill us.”

  “But we can all see, so it’s a better situation than we were in a moment ago.” Chell reminded her.

  “You can go back if you want.” Cal offered.

  She narrowed her eyes and glared at him. “How do you expect us to get across?”

  Cal turned back to look. “It’s, what? Ten meters? I can jump that.”

  “Fifteen I’d say.” Sidian replied, looking over the edge and stepping back.

  “I can jump that?” Cal said again, a little less confidently.

  “And the rest of us?” Leni asked.

  “Well I can carry Chell but you…” He trailed off, looking up at the much larger dragon-like woman. “So maybe we find another way.” Cal said, frowning and looking around again.

  “It looks like there’s supposed to be a bridge.” Chell noted, looking over the edge. Cal leaned out alongside her and saw what she was staring at. There was a very clear square indent just below where they were standing.

  Cal looked back up at the opposite end, squinting then his eyes widened. “There’s a lever over there.” He noted.

  Chell moved up next to him, squinting as well. “Behind the brazier?”

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  “Yeah, see it?” Cal asked. She nodded.

  “It could be a trick.” Leni said, stepping up beside them, and peering across the river.

  “Could be a way across.” Cal countered, backing up from the cliff edge. He disappeared into the darkness, counting his steps. Then, before anyone could say anything he sprinted forward.

  One foot in front of the next he ran as fast as he could towards the drop. His stomach began to protest when he was only five steps away. Every time he did this his stomach would fight it. It was almost enough to make him stop, but he ignored it and powered through. It was only natural after all, the body didn’t know that the feet had magic on them.

  He hit the cliff edge and pushed off, twisting slightly at the balls of his feet as he did so. He felt power rush downwards from the top of his boots at his calfs, to his ankles, over his feet and into the soles. Cal was thrown forward with a blast of force. Not so much that he couldn’t control it, but enough that he went soaring across the river.

  It was about half way across when he realised that he wasn’t going to make it. He was going to be about a meter shy.

  He cursed loudly, but as his arc dipped below the lip of the cliff he yelled out, “Emdiness!” There was a strong pull just below his ribs, as if grabbed by a fishing hook or something and then he vanished, reappearing about five meters up and falling at the perfect arc to land and roll on the other side of the cliff. He hit hard, bouncing and slamming into the door. He was lucky not to have landed in the fire.

  Cal was dazed and lay there blinking through the pain and confusion for what felt like an hour - but must have been a minute - before he was able to shake himself out of it.

  It wasn’t just the confusion of hitting the ground hard, the use of the spell itself disorientated him. With some practice and some training he’d be able to do it without needing time to recover, but having only recently succeeded in learning this much, he was still at the mercy of such drawbacks. A person who had planar affinity wouldn’t have had this problem, it would have been a part of who they were, but Cal, who was in some ways muscling in on something he shouldn’t, got a bad reaction.

  When he came back to himself he could hear Chell and Sidian shouting.

  Cal forced himself slowly to his feet and shook off the dust, reaching for the lever. He sighed and pulled it. There was a rumble and Cal heard several ‘kerchunk’ noises like heavy gears dropping into place. The whole room seemed to shake for a moment and Cal almost fell back down, but then it settled and a light vibration replaced it.

  “Thats it!” Chell was calling from across the river, waving. He looked down and a long thick and wide stone bridge was being fed out of a gap just beneath where Cal now stood.

  Cal leaned back against the nearest wall, suddenly exhausted after his flirt with death and the use of that transport magic. It had taken a lot out of him, but it had worked, so he was pleased, grinning to himself just a little.

  The bridge attached in a minute or so and then the others crossed carefully. When they reached the other side Chell rushed over. “That was awesome!” she said.

  “Since when can you use spacial magic?” Leni demanded, stepping up behind Chell.

  “You have fire affinity don’t you? You’re a fire mage.” Sidian asked.

  “Yeah, sort of. I mean, yes I have fire affinity, but I’m not really a mage. I’ve just got a few spells and a sword. I do mostly use fire, but I’ve trained a few other things up as well.”

  Sidian nodded, understanding. He crossed an arm over his chest and held his chin. “Teleport is hard to learn though, how far can you go with it? Is it the only planar magic you can do? When did you start learning?” Sidian asked, his magical interests taking him over.

  Cal chuckled. It was always good to see Sidian’s inquisitive side come out. “I can only go about twice that distance I just did, about 10 meters, maybe a bit less. But it takes a hell of a lot out of me. I’m not going to be doing anything like that again today. I might be able to use another fire spell of a similar strength, but I’m going to try to stick to my core fire spells for now.” To punctuate the statement he drew his sword back out and re-ignighted it.

  There were a few spells that Cal could do as easily as breathing, setting fire to his hand and sword was one of them, throwing a flame bullet was another. “I've been trying to use a little bit of diviners magic but it’s pretty much just the fire spells and the short range teleport, and I’ve been practicing this for about as long as we’ve been grouped up, only started working a couple days ago honestly. Wasn’t sure it was going to work then.” Having finished answering Sidian’s questions, he held the sword up and stepped away from the wall. “I’ll let you take a look at the door, Chell.” He said, giving her room to move.

  Chell slipped past him to the door and withdrew her tools again. She checked around the edge for traps, whispering about how easy it would be for them to be killed on this little cliff edge, and finally worked on the keyhole in the centre of the door. After a while they all heard the lock click into place and then the door swung open.

  As it did so braziers like lanterns that dotted the walls inside magically ignited with light blue flames, lighting the room. It was a square room, large enough for them all to fit into, but not much bigger. In the centre was what looked like a large font, but there was no water inside. It was covered in symbols that Cal recognised as fire magic runes. The floor of the room was stone, and the walls started blue, then went orange and finally red at the top. They were also covered in the same symbols, etched into patterns that looked like flames stretching all over them.

  The wall opposite had a golden archway with a redwood door that had a single keyhole in the centre and more fire carvings like on the golden door.

  Chell moved carefully in first and then after a moment motioned the others in. Cal walked in after her with Leni and Sidian close behind.

  The only thing in the room that they could interact with was the font so Cal moved straight over to that. Other than the fire magic symbols on the outside it looked like any other font.

  “Theres an opening at the centre of the basin.” Chell noted, inspecting it more closely. She ran her fingers over the bowl and then up to the edge. “And it’s very slightly slick to the touch. I think whatever it is is coming from under the lip.” She sniffed her fingers and made an expression of disgust. “Ugh, what- is that fire oil?”

  Cal placed a finger in the bowl and wiped it across the surface before sniffing it. It was fire oil. “Yeah okay, I get it. Fire iconography everywhere, it wants fire.”

  He brought his sword, still alight with his flames, around and into the font. The sword had barely reached the font when it went up, a burst of flame from the blade and the whole bowl was on fire. There was an initial rage and then it began to crackle calmly. For a moment nothing else happened, and then it seemed like the centre of the bowl melted and two pieces of metal slid aside, revealing a key in the recess. But the fire didn’t go away.

  “Anyone got any water?” Leni asked.

  “It’s fire oil. It’ll just wash the fire into the hole and then it’ll be even harder to get to.” Cal explained, eying the key. He frowned for a long moment and then looked down at his arm. He could reach it, it would just hurt. He considered for a long moment and then started undressing.

  “Whoa, what’re you-” Leni started.

  “Oh, yeah, that works.” Chell agreed as Cal pulled off his chest armour and then his shirt handing them to Chell.

  He took a breath and then, holding his right arm out ahead of him said “Voshar!” His tone was commanding, powerful. Flames errupted from his hand like they had a million times before, but then they spread, down his arm, to his shoulder. It flickered over his chest a little, but remained mostly on his arm.

  He stepped over to the font and reached in. His own flames didn’t hurt him, he didn’t even noticed the heat. What they did do, however was protect him from other heat sources. As he stuck his hand into the fire oil’s flames he felt warmth, but nothing more than that. He leaned in until the font’s flames were licking his shoulder. He had to turn his head away, the heat was roasting his eyes and his chest but with a little instruction from Chell he was able to feel around and find the key, pulling it out and throwing it to the floor.

  “That was amazing!” Chell exclaimed when he let the fire vanish and handed him back his shirt.

  “Thanks.” Cal grinned, taking it and putting his clothes and armour back on. For a long few moments Cal panted. Vosh was a nothing spell to cal. Voshar was a little more exhausting, especially right after the teleport.

  There was a yelp behind them and they turned to see Leni standing over the key and waving her hand in pain. “It was just in fire…” Cal reminded her, confused by her foolishness.

  She growled at him as he stepped over and - whispering “Vosh.” - picked the key up with his flaming hand.

  “I could have done that if-”

  “But you didn’t.” Cal grinned, back stepping and walking over to the door. Chell checked it for traps, but she found nothing and motioned Cal forward. He unlocked it and pushed it open, revealing the next room. It was a circle with a single door on the opposite end.

  Leni stepped into the room without waiting for Chell to check it, annoyance and embarrassment pushing her on. She pushed the door to check that it wasn’t going to close again, and marched right down the centre towards the exit.

  “Stop!” Cal yelled, but Leni ignored him, right up until the thunk to her left, and then another to her right announced the presence of guards.

  Leni froze, looking sideways to see the horrors that had descended upon her.

  “Er… guys…” She said, uncertainly.

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