Crowned in Black: Ch 33

I went to see Ignas just after sunset, alone, while the others were getting ready for our trip to the Dragon Gate. I arrived to find Masha sitting by his bedside, quietly reading to him from a small, black leather-bound book. The language she spoke was different, but Churrvi was similar enough to Tuun that I recognized the lilting, soft cadence and some of the words. She was reading to His Majesty from the Book of the Dead, prayers and instructional chants intended to soothe and guide the dying as they left their bodies, and joined the chorus of the Caul of Souls.

I cleared my throat softly. “Masterhealer?”

Masha’s voice trailed off, and she looked back at me. “Ahh, Lord Tuun. It is almost time.”

Frowning, I let myself inside. Vilmos was there, his sword over his knees. He looked pale and somber. Simeon was in the other bed that had been moved to the room, sleeping before his shift. And Ignas… Ignas was sedated, mercifully unconscious. All over him, erupting from the pores of his skin, were tiny crystal slivers. As I stared in wordless horror, Masha lifted the bandage over his eyes. His eyesockets looked like geodes filled with spines of bluish, streaky white glass. The rest of his skin was pale and greyish. He wasn’t breathing on his own any more. A mana-powered respirator had been set up beside his bed.

“We induced a coma to spare him from pain,” Masha said heavily. “This particular form of Stranging is agonizing. The skin and joints are colonized first. Then the organs. When the crystals fill his lungs, he will die.”

“How long?”

Masha shrugged. “Two days. Maybe three. It progressed faster than we thought it would. I now believe that he was forcefed alchemical potions while he was imprisoned… probably to keep him alive through the tortures inflicted on him. That would explain why has collapsed so rapidly following his transfusion.”

I didn’t know what to say, so I just… nodded, and gazed at Ignas for several long minutes. I wanted to take his hand, or do something, but even if he was unconscious, it felt like I’d just be hurting more.

“We’re about to go to the Gate,” I said, after a while. “And if Matir was telling the truth, we’ll return with healing magic.”

“Mana cannot cure mana toxicity,” Masha replied. “But… it is worth trying. Always.”

“Always.” I gave her shoulder a soft squeeze, glanced back at Ignas, and bowed my head before leaving the room.

To reach the Gate of Endless Night, we had to follow the Dark Star - so named because it appeared as a black blot against the huge golden expanse of the moon’s surface during the Fall months. The star was actually the Dragon Gate of Veles, and on the equinox, it hovered directly over the tomb of his son, Matir, pointing the way to the very southern reaches of Myszno.

Karalti was braced for bad weather before her teleport, but when we burst into the mountain gorge that sheltered the entry, there was no shear to speak of. We appeared over a massive sinkhole ringed with glacial waterfalls. They were huge enough to drown out all sound, plunging into a fathomless black abyss. On the other side of the falls rose two enormous obelisks that stretched from the depths of the sinkhole to a height greater than the closest mountain. Even without a storm raging overhead, the Thunderstones spat and arced with power. There was enough magical energy in the air to make our teeth hum.

“Wow…” Rin breathed through our party voice chat. “These have got to be one of the foci for the Caul of Souls.”

“Yeah. And I have a feeling they’re somehow connected to that.” I pointed up at the dark speck hovering against the face of Erruku. “If any of you have a telescope, hell…we could probably make out some details.”

“I left mine back in the Strelitzia,” Gar replied. “Didn’t want to lose the damn thing when we die.”

“If we die,” Suri corrected.

“No. WHEN we die. This dungeon is rated ten levels higher than we are. If we don’t die, something’s wrong with the damn game.”

“I wanna go to the Dark Star! Because Dragons! In! SPAAAAACE!” Karalti sang to herself as she glided smoothly down into the sinkhole, breaching the cloud of mist thrown up by the Niagara-sized falls. “It’s the one place uncorrupted by feudalism!”

I laughed as Karalti angled toward the entry to the Dragon Gate complex: a narrow crevasse that ran between two waterfalls, so unnaturally dark that even I couldn’t see inside, darkvision or no darkvision. Karalti and I had to navigate by ear and intuition, holding a steady, straight course to avoid clipping the steep rock faces to either side.

We glided out into a massive lake-bottomed cavern, a space big enough to house at least five hundred dragons. It was lit by a diffuse gold-gray light, which illuminated countless nesting niches and neatly tunneled caves I now recognized as dragon apartments. Great hexagonal pillars supported a towering ceiling. At the very center of the columns was a tiered platform, like a round step pyramid, and on top of that, a stone circle which framed a large, empty well - a sacrificial well to Matir. The magelights that lit this place made clever use of the surrounding stones to give the well a starburst-shaped shadow.

“Was this place a dragon town, or a temple?” Suri’s fear of heights was tempered by awe as she leaned out from her harness, taking in the sights.

“Town, temple, and tomb, is my bet. Solonkratsu society was on the decline by the time Matir was stuffed into the Dragon Gate.”

“Definitely feels like a tomb. It’s creepy.” Rin shuddered, clutching her harness straps. “I feel like the walls are watching me.”

“Ahh…haha, funny you should say that.”I glanced at the shadowed alcoves, but there was no movement. Yet. “Last time I was here, these things called ‘Darkforms’ came out and attacked us. They’re like dopplegangers on steroids. Be careful.”

The platform wasn’t big enough for a dragon to land, which said something about the nature of Matir’s clergy. Karalti’s ability to polymorph was an ability only queen dragons and possibly humanoid mages possessed. She backwinged, and reached out to cling to the side of the altar like a bat at first, holding on as the four of us dismounted. Karalti followed us up, melting down into her human form on the second-highest ledge of the dais. While Suri and Gar warily drew their weapons, I lay on my belly and reached down to pull her up.

“Well, nothing’s trying to eat us!” Rin said brightly, anxiously patting Lovelace’s turret barrel. “How do we get to the Dragon Gate?”

I hopped up to the edge of the well. “We have to jump down here.”

“Jump…down the well?”Gar flashed me a look of disbelief. Rin turned an interesting shade of platinum as the blue blood under her silvery cheeks drained away. Even Suri looked restless.

“It’s a Matir thing.” I shrugged, and turned around so I was facing the outside. Karalti fearlessly vaulted up beside me. “Give each person a count of ten. See you down there.”

“Uhh-” Suri took a step forward, but I’d already stepped back, holding my arms up over my head as the darkness swallowed me.

Entering Matir’s Gate was no less terrifying the second time. Cold air whipped over my armor and through the seams of my helmet. At first, the feeling of falling was intense, and without the ability to see down, there was the overwhelming animal terror that at any point, I was going to smash into something and go splat. But after a few seconds, the rushing whistle of the wind faded, along with the sensation of falling. Instead, I felt like I was suspended in the darkness, floating…then rising. My brain oriented just before a dim light opened up, and I stepped out of a circular portal into a big stone box. A pair of braziers burned with pale blue flames beside a pair of double doors that looked like they were made of rusted iron. In the center of the door was a palm-shaped pressure plate with Matir’s nine-pointed chaos star in the center, burning with baleful light. And as I waited for the others, a deep, rolling double BOOM passed through the floor. The twin sounds made the brazier flames wobble, and left every cell of my body vibrating until it slowly faded away.

“Matir’s heartbeat,” I murmured to myself. “Keep it going just a little longer, man.”

Karalti stepped out of the portal, then Suri. Suri was an interesting pale cream coffee color, and wordlessly stumbled forward to grasp my shoulder. I patted her hand, looking to the portal. Each divine heartbeat was exactly a minute apart, so after twenty seconds passed and no one else appeared, I frowned and pulled up the group chat. I had just messaged Rin and Gar when the portal flared, and spat out Hopper, Lovelace, then Rin in a pile. The Mercurion squeaked as she tripped forward, arms flailing, and flattened Lovelace. The robot chittered in alarm as it was squashed down, its crab-like legs splayed.

“S-Sorry I didn’t…I mean I waited longer!”she stammered. “I didn’t want to jump down the hole, so Gar umm…”

“Pushed you?” I reached out and clapped a hand into hers, pulling her out of the way.

“Uh…yeah. Kinda.”Rin got clumsily to her feet, and moved aside just in time for the portal to dispense Gar. The older man also looked pale and pasty, legs wobbling as he stumbled forward.

“Te lo juro por dios. Never want to do that again.” He dusted himself off, shuddering and briefly clenching his jaw.

“Alright, all here and accounted for.” I sighed, and went over to the door. As I approached it, the handprint on the pressure plate flared with a thin corona of dark blue light. I reached out and lay my branded hand against it, and as I did, the air around us filled with a light, masculine tenor, a ghostly voice carrying just the edge of a hiss. “Hail to you, Herald of the Hidden Seed. Hail, Paragon of the Triad. Hail to you… Hector Dragozin-Corvinus.”

I closed my eyes as an invisible wave of force pushed against my palm, followed by a chill that seemed to rush through my veins, all the way to my heart. My voided shoulder throbbed strangely, but once the chill reached my head, it reinforced the information I’d learned last time I was here - and offered me the option to open the door.

“Okay,” I said softly, looking back at the others. “The antechamber to the actual Dragon Gate is behind this door. The Gate itself… no one has opened it in two millennia. We have no idea what we’re going to find behind it, and no way to know. If you want to make a final check over your quickslots, do it during the walk. Once we reach the door… we open it.”

“Got it.” Suri had recovered her composure, and reached up to grip the hilt of her sword. “If Sachara could do this, then I can.”

“Yeah! And my great-great-great-GREAT grandma did this, too!” Karalti rolled her shoulders and bounced to loosen herself. “Everyone do your best!”

“I-I still don’t think I’m cut out for this,” Rin said. “But… but I can do my best.”

“And I don’t think I buy this whole ‘Triad’ thing. Isn’t the Triad some Chinese gang?” Gar scowled at the door. “I ain’t no ‘Artist’. I was a damn greasemonkey.”

“Well, if the door opens, then you know you are for sure,” Karalti replied. “And if it doesn’t open, then we throw you back up the well and we go find the real Artist, okay?”

“Throw me back up the well,” Gar repeated flatly.

“Believe me, I can throw you UP a well. Human shape or no human shape.” Karalti bared her fangs at him. Pretty as she was in her human shape, she kept her draconic teeth. A double row of fangs was surprisingly intimidating on a woman of her size.

I rolled my eyes at both of them, then turned back and willed the door to open. The pressure plate turned, then receded as the doors swung out with a squeal, revealing a corridor of pure white opal. It was lit from everywhere and nowhere, the light subtly pulsing in time with Matir’s heartbeat, and framed a lightless doorway of pure black at the end. The tunnel was frigid, dry and cold. There was no actual door at the end of this tunnel - it opened out into a humming void of velvet darkness. The air smelled intensely of mana, searing our sinuses with its unpleasant, metallic smell. There was only around five feet of floor at the end of the door: a long, glittering white opal bridge spanned across the chasm, ending at a great stone circle similar to the one that surrounded the well entry. And behind that…

“Wow.” Karalti’s eyes widened as she took a step out onto the bridge. The entry to the Dragon Gate proper was a massive, cherry-blossom shaped portal made of five interlocking ‘petals’ that were wrought in aurum and lambidium. I’d mistaken them for gold and silver and the first time I’d seen them, but knew now these metals were far more precious, and way more magically conductive. As we watched, another double boom echoed across the void of space, the flower-shaped door flexing like a diaphragm.

“Last time I was here, Violetta and Ashur told me some stuff.” I drew a deep breath, and stepped out onto the bridge. “They told me that Matir specifically and the Caul generally eats and destroys souls. Lahati had a different story, that the Caul only cycles the souls of the dead for a short time, then releases them. Whenever I see one of these doors, or feel that heartbeat coming out from behind it…I have to admit, I don’t know which one of the two to believe.”

Karalti hissed. “You can’t believe the words of the Deceivers. They were called that for a reason.”

“Yeah. I’m trusting in that.”

At the end of the bridge, in front of the door, was an altar. Now that I wasn’t amnesiac and reeling with the fact I was half-dead, I was able to notice some details about it. There were six circles around the hexagonal base, one for each of the Triad. The one that represented the Warsinger - as in the machine, versus the human pilot - had a weird pipe-organ like configuration of tubes and a slot just big enough to fit a hand inside. I hadn’t really noticed this when Ashur and Violetta had dragged me here, thinking I was nothing but an obedient thrall. I went around to look at it... then started to laugh.

"What?" Suri came around to examine the device as well.

"I told you how Fang Daddy and Violetta brought me here to open the Gate so they could open it and tackle the dungeon," I said. "Well, even if I had been a real thrall, I wouldn't have been able to. Does this remind you of anything?"

"It's the same kind of blood-drawing device in the Rose Vault." Suri's lips twitched. "For me, and maybe Karalti as well."

"It sure is." I gave the device a fond pat, then went around and pulled the Spear off my back. I gave the weapon a twirl, then set it against the giant key slot. "Ready?"

Suri sighed, and put her hand inside the device. There was a soft 'snick', and she grunted. "What is it about the ancients and shit that draws, eats, or uses blood?"

"Well, technically, it's because we have mana in our blood, so blood is naturally magically conductive and... umm... never mind." Rin cleared her throat, watching anxiously.

"Yeah, but they could have used some other bodily fluid. The fucking Pee Meter has to be good for something." I was joking to take the edge off my nerves as I slowly pushed the Spear down. The blade rasped along the inside of the channel, before the rounded surfaces of first stones made contact with some unseen mechanism. The keyhole expanded slightly, letting me drive the weapon all the way down, then snapped shut and locked the Spear of Creation in place.

We all looked to the door expectantly, tensing as the giant heartbeat made the structure extrude and reverberate... but it didn't open.

"We're missing something." I looked back to Rin and Gar. "Stand in those other circles."

"Well, look at Mr Bossy Britches." Gar grumbled, but strode over to one of the circles. As Rin took her place, two small, flickering holographic tablets appeared. "What the fuck...?"

"OH! This is... this is the written form of Solonkratuu, I think." Rin worried her lip as the square of light began to scroll with an unfamiliar script. "Uhh... Karalti...?"

"There's a written form?" Karalti bounded over, eyes wide. "Ooh!"

"Can you read it?" I tested the Spear, but it wasn't budging. Suri still had her hand inside the Warsinger needle-niche.

"Yeah, kinda." Karalti's gaze flicked from symbol to symbol, the veins of silver in her irises expanding. "Uh... okay. You two need to read off some words of power: Uuchulin sanak olg'doru doru'glannesh."

"Uuchulin sanak olg'doru doru'glannesh." Rin repeated the words with the confidence of an experienced magician, while Gar kind of mumbled them. But the effect was immediate: with all of us at our stations, the gigantic door began to open. The floor under our feet rumbled, swaying as the metal leaves slowly uncoiled from the center, each section vanishing into the walls to reveal a beautifully worked, dark blue mosaic floor. It swept slightly downwards into perfect darkness.

[New Location Discovered: The Sephulchre of the Black God.]

"Well... here goes nothing." As the Spear loosened, I twisted it a little and pulled it free, checking behind us to make sure we hadn't been followed. There was nothing and no one there, but I couldn't shake the sensation of being watched as I headed for the abyss. "As they say in the army, it's always darkest before pitch black."