II - Sigh of Smoke

Chapter 26 - Home

-Atlanta-

The chasm was strangely smaller than she remembered it. She guessed she could attribute that to the three years she was gone.

In the weak moonlight the gaping crevasse engulfed the glow, vast and nearly endless. Atlanta's side of the fissure was slightly raised higher than the kingdom across from it, the long bridge raised and looming ahead of her. The wall it was embedded in dwarfed the wall of Wyvengard tenfold, standing so tall that it seemed to swallow the stars. Fiercely monstrous, as she remembered it. Delicious chills danced down her spine.

"So, how will we be getting across this?" Piper asked, curious humour laced in his words as he smirked at the dark hole.

Atlanta tried to ignore him. She also tried to ignore the odd looks Menaleen and Pods were giving her. She tossed to Dareon his bow and quiver, and ensured she had all her blades sheathed at her hips. All of them had donned their cloaks, though their hoods were not pulled up to cover their faces. There was no need to.

It had been hours since they had rescued Aleksandra from the Arena of the Wickeds, Valar Trova's speech hovering in the back of their minds. The witch had not woken up at all, and seemed so deep in slumber that no one bothered to rouse her. Atlanta hardly cared. Her own heart was in her throat, almost on her toes with excitement.

We're here.

Home.

"So?" Piper turned to the rest of them, "I haven't actually been in Zarkarath's capital. Ever. I suggest one o' you start plannin' how we'll be getting in here without getting caught like a man's cock in a—"

"No." Dareon interrupted, eyes closed tightly as he raised a hand to Piper. "Just... No."

The other man shrugged.

Lucan's furrowed brows turned to Atlanta, black eyes prodding. "How would we be getting in?" He asked. When he received no reaction he turned to Menaleen, who stepped back with hands raised.

Her loose curls shook, "Madame Ba-ava had not mentioned this part to me."

"She mentioned it to me," Pods nodded, calming his horses who whinnied softly, uncertain at the gap in the earth. "We'll be using the old tunnels."

The old tunnels. Atlanta blinked at the faded memory of dark halls where many murmured and hid in the shadows. It had smelled of shit and the smoky remains of magic. Men, women, and children once roamed the tunnels, but she knew that they were now empty. It was a web of paths underneath the earth that only led to the surface where no one could see, and where no one wanted to be.

"Shh, my child," a woman's voice echoed from the past, shaking and unhinged as a pair of arms would wrap around her small form. "Mother is right here. No one will take me from you."

Atlanta shivered as she shook the memory from her mind. Cold sweat fell from her forehead as she reminded herself that there were no more people in that sweltering darkness. 

"Tunnels?" Dareon asked curiously.

"Yes," Atlanta started. "Beneath the kingdom is a system of tunnels that both lead into the city, and into the chasm. If we can find an entrance here—" she pointed sharply into the black pit, "—then we can follow a path until we find ourselves back on the surface."

Seeing Dareon's expression, she added, "we will meet no one down there. No one should be there anymore."

"I'm not as worried about who we may find there, but how exactly we would get there..." His whisper almost went unheard.