Quest's End: The Broken Key #3 (42 page)

“Perhaps,” replied Bart.

The passage showed signs of people having passed this way at some point in the recent past. Dust along the floor was disturbed, as well as spider webs hanging in disarray.

Several side passages and rooms abutted the one they were traveling along. Some showed further evidence of grave robbing with corpses again lying in undignified heaps. Chests had been smashed open and a few held shelves now barren, whatever had been kept upon them gone.

“Are you sure you’re going the right way?” Bart asked the man leading them.

“Not entirely, no,” he replied. “Like I said, I’ve never been down here. I did however hear one of the sledgers they brought down here comment that he and the others had worked for a day to get by an extremely sturdy iron gate. He claimed that the blows from their sledgehammers barely dented the metal.”

Bart glanced to Kevik who explained, “The metal could have been magically enhanced to withstand blows.”

The man in the lead glanced back to Kevik and said, “That’s what he thought too.”

“Interesting,” was the only response Bart gave. In his mind however, wheels were turning. A magically enforced gate? That could only mean one thing. The final segment of the key had to lie somewhere on the other side! He glanced back to Riyan and could see by the crooked smile and the glint in his eye that he was thinking along those same lines.

No torches lit the way down this passage. Without Kevik’s light, they would be in complete darkness. Fortunately, the glow from the tip of his staff provided ample illumination.

Continuing to follow the passage, they soon came to where the doors and branching passageways ended, and still the passageway continued on. Not far after the last doorway, they came to where a massive gate had once barred the way.

“I can see why this would have taken some time to get past,” Bart observed when the light from Kevik’s staff revealed it.

It actually wasn’t so much a gate as a series of eight evenly spaced, six inch thick bars that ran from the ceiling to the floor. A hole large enough to allow a man to pass had been battered into the obstruction on the left side. Only the two bars on the far right showed no sign of damage, the others were bent all out of alignment.

“They must have worked at this for a long time,” observed Chyfe.

As Riyan was nodding agreement, Kevik uttered magical words. A second later, all eight of the bars glowed blue.

“As we thought,” Kevik said to the others. “Magic.”

“Right,” said Bart. Turning to their captives, he asked, “What else did you hear about this area?”

“Nothing,” the man leading them replied.

“We swear,” another asserted. “We’ve told you all we know.”

Bart gauged the truthfulness of what they were saying. Finally deciding they would have no reason to lie, he said to Chyfe and Chad, “Tie them up.”

“But,” the man who led them here began to wail, “you can’t leave us here!”

“Don’t worry,” Bart assured him and the other two. “We’ll pick you up on our way back and make sure we leave you where others are sure to find you.”

Chad and Chyfe tore lengths of cloth from the clothes of their captives and proceeded to secure their arms and legs.

“What if you don’t return?” another of the men asked, barely containing the fear of being left to die.

Bart turned to the man and said, “You better hope we do.” Then to Chad and Chyfe he added, “Gag them too. Can’t have them calling for help while we’re gone.”

“But…” one of the captives began to say before a wad of cloth was stuffed into his mouth and tied off with another strip of cloth.

Once the three men were secured and not likely to get free, Bart said, “Alright, let’s see what lies beyond here.” Ignoring the muffled cries of the men begging them not to be left behind, he went to the bars and slipped through to the other side. With the others right behind, he began moving further down the passage. The cries of the bound men gradually diminished behind them.

The passage continued as it had before the bars, with no doorways or branching passages. For a hundred feet they walked in silence before arriving at a set of steps leading down. Bart paused prior to stepping upon the first step and turned back to the others. “From the looks of it, there hasn’t been as much traffic through here as in the other passage we were in earlier,” he stated.

“Do you think there might be traps?” asked Riyan.

Bart nodded. “Possible, though unlikely. Step where I step and keep at least a step between you, just in case.” With that, he turned back and began making his way slowly down the steps.

Seventeen steps descended into darkness before ending at the beginning of another passage. This one was narrower by half than the one at the top of the steps. It was barely wide enough for two men to walk side by side. Plain though the walls were, they seemed to be constructed of a darker material than those on the level above.

Coming to stand upon the last step, Bart hesitated a moment before continuing on. Running his hand over the darker material, he noticed that it felt smoother than it should.

“This place has a feel to it,” Kevik said from over his shoulder.

Removing his hand from the wall, Bart glanced back over his shoulder to the magic user. “What kind?” he asked.

Kevik shook his head. “Not sure,” he replied. “It doesn’t feel bad though.” He stepped on the bottom step next to Bart then spoke a series of magical words as he cast a spell. When nothing happened, he cast another which failed to produce any effect.

Glancing to Bart he said, “There’s no magic here.”

“That’s good to hear,” he replied.

The floor of the passage moving away from the steps showed signs of others passing this way. Despite that evidence, Bart took it slow and easy as he left the bottom step. Moving along, he kept his senses alert for any shift in the floor or anything else that might foreshadow danger. Behind him, the others moved along in silence. It was almost as if none dared to disturb the darkness.

Not far from the steps, they came to an obstruction in the passage. Two thick timbers stood on end and were wedged in between the floor and ceiling.

“What do we have here?” Bart mumbled to himself. Turning to the others, he said, “Stay back a moment.” Then returning his gaze to the timbers, he moved closer.

The ends of the timbers showed evidence of having been wedged into place by the use of hammers. Bart touched one of the timbers gingerly, then applied more pressure to see if it would move. It was wedged tightly in place. He then knelt down and examined the floor more closely. There was a faint red hue to the surface of the floor around the base of the timbers, kind of the color of dried blood.

Using his fingers, he examined the floor more closely. When he discovered an area two foot by one that was slightly lower than the rest of the floor, he nodded to himself. “It was a trap,” he said as he came to his feet. Glancing back to the others, he pointed to the reddish area at the base of the timbers, “I’m not completely sure, but I think that when someone steps here, the ceiling smashes down onto them.”

“Brutal,” Chyfe observed.

Bart nodded. “Yeah,” he agreed. “Should be safe now that they have it braced. But just to be on the safe side, try not to step in the reddish area.” Turning back to the timbers bracing the ceiling, he made his way carefully between them.

One by one the others followed without mishap. As they began moving away, Chad commented to Riyan, “How do you suppose they put it back in the ceiling?”

Shrugging, Riyan replied, “I don’t know. Maybe it resets by itself.”

Chad nodded then cast one last glance back at the timbers before Kevik’s light moved on and they disappeared back into the darkness.

A minute later Bart announced, “There’s another one.” And sure enough, another pair of timbers was braced against the ceiling. At their base, the floor was also stained a reddish hue, testament to the lethality of the trap.

“Deadly sort of place,” quipped Chyfe.

“You could say that,” Bart replied. Then just as before, they slipped through the two timbers and proceeded on.

The timbers had barely faded back into the darkness behind them when they noticed the floor beginning to slant downward at a gentle angle. Not far after that they came to another open pit in the floor. Planks were placed across to allow movement from one side to the other. As they crossed over, Kevik’s light illuminated iron spikes dotting the bottom. Unlike the pit trap they had found previously, there was no rotting corpse.

“Nice of them to trip all the traps for us,” Riyan said.

“Sure is a lot easier than what we went through in Algoth,” Bart said. Then he glanced back at Riyan and grinned. “But not as much fun.”

“Fun he calls it,” argued Kevik as he rolled his eyes. “We almost died time and again.”

“Almost, Kevik,” replied Bart. “That’s what made it a great adventure.”

Kevik just shook his head. Putting one’s life in jeopardy wasn’t what he would call a ‘great adventure’.

Ten feet past the pit, they came to an area with irregular charcoal outlines drawn on the floor. Bart had them pause a couple feet before reaching them. It looked like someone had drawn odd shaped ovals along the floor. “Kevik,” he said to the magic user, “hold out your light as close to those as you can.”

Kevik nodded then stretched his arm out. They could see at least ten of the oval shaped markings spaced along the passage ahead. Half of the last one disappeared where the illumination of Kevik’s light ended.

“Pressure plates,” Bart said. “Has to be.”

“What do they do?” Kevik asked.

“Let’s find out,” Bart said. Then he motioned for the others to step back a ways. Removing a length of rope from his pack, Bart secured it to the shoulder straps of his pack. Once it was on tight, he took the rope in hand and began swinging the pack back and forth above the floor. When he had sufficient momentum built up, he let it go. Sailing across the floor, the pack landed dead center on the first of the charcoal outlines.

Ping!

Something shot from the right and struck the stone wall on the left, three feet from the floor before falling to the ground. Bart moved forward and found it to be a two inch dart with a jagged, glistening point.

He avoided any contact with the glistening substance as he picked it up. Holding it for the others to see he said, “Poisoned dart. Stepping on any of the pressure plates would have a similar affect I’m sure.” Tossing the dart to the ground, he added, “Make sure to avoid the charcoal outlines and we should be fine.” When he stepped back from where he had retrieved the dart, he pulled in the rope.

Untying his pack, he slung it again over his back and began making his way through the field of pressure plates. “Kevik,” he said. “Cast a light spell every few feet until we get through. That should give everyone sufficient light to make their way.”

“You got it,” replied Kevik. A moment later, a bobbing sphere appeared and began moving about. He heard Bart sigh when he saw it. He knew how much they annoyed him. “Just like Algoth,” he said with a grin. “Part of the ‘fun’ we had.”

Bart glanced back at him and grinned, then laughed. “Come on,” he said. Riyan and Chad chuckled too. They then began carefully wending their way between the deadly pressure plates outlined on the floor.

The pressure plates extended for a good thirty feet before they ended. After that, the passage returned to a more level state as it continued on.

“How far does this go?” asked Chyfe. “Doesn’t it seem a bit excessive?”

“It does seem that way,” agreed Chad. “But who knows what purpose this place originally had?”

“True,” Chyfe agreed.

The passage continued for another forty feet before opening up onto a room. Murals adorned two of the four walls. One depicted a scene of warriors fighting demons, the same demons that had been portrayed in a similar mural in The Crypt, and as demonic statues beneath the Ruins of Algoth. The third wall, the one directly opposite where they stood, bore a large rendition of the coat of arms bearing the stripe. Beneath the coat of arms were four separate, indented spaces. Each of the indented spaces was curved and sank three inches into the wall with a two inch space separating each from its neighbors. Looking at the spaces as a whole, they appeared to form a broken circle.

“Yes!” Riyan exclaimed. It was just like what Bart and Kevik had found deep beneath the Ruins of Algoth. Back then, Bart had placed one of the key segments within one of the indented spaces which had caused a secret door to open revealing the hiding place of another key segment.

“Take it easy,” cautioned Bart. He could tell his friend was barely able to restrain the urge to rush forward. “Let me have a look around, first.”

Aside from the murals and coat of arms adorning the walls, the floor was littered with the shattered remains of over a score of chests. Whatever treasures they once contained were long gone.

“Kevik, cast your detect magic spell if you would,” Bart said before entering the room. Behind him he heard Kevik mutter the magical words, then the wall bearing the coat of arms began to glow blue, indicating that there was magic present.

“Thanks,” Bart said as he moved into the room and slowly crossed over to the glowing wall. When he drew closer, he discovered indications that someone had tried breaking through the wall bearing the coat of arms. Hundreds of nicks scored the wall in the area of the four indented spaces, but none had caused much damage.

Raising his voice so it would carry to where the others still stood in the passage, he said, “Looks like they tried to break their way through here and failed.”

“So it should still be there?” asked an excited Riyan.

Bart glanced back to him and nodded. Then he waved for the others to join him. “I think it’s safe,” he told them.

Riyan was the first out of the passage and practically ran across the room. Before he was halfway there, he had his pack off and was digging through it for one of the three segments wrapped in cloth at the bottom. As he reached Bart’s side, he pulled forth one of the segments and dropped his pack to the floor. With hands almost shaking from excitement, he removed the cloth covering it.