King of Dust

Chapter 13

Astrid clung to me as we descended the dark, musty stairs. Cobwebs tickled my face as the four of us walked down the spiral staircase into the unknown.

"Anyone else find it creepy that this family has a secret, one-person wide staircase down into their murder dungeon?" Yra asked in the dark.

"Oh, incredibly," Urien replied. He trailed his hand along the wall and continued downward. "Something horrible happened here – we just need to find out what."

"I heard some stories around town." Astrid took my hand and circled her thumb in my palm. "The people say that the owners of this house did horrible, horrible things to others. Victims disappeared until one day no one came out."

"Do you remember anything, Darius?"

I wracked my brain for any information, but the fog clouded the corners of my mind and remembering anything about the situation felt impossible. "Nothing's coming up."

"You were talking with someone who ran a murder cult house, and nothing is coming up?" Yra snapped.

"Sh," Urien instructed. "We're here."

Urien slowly opened the door at the bottom of the stairs. The entire place was pitch black, shrouded in utter darkness. When the door closed behind us, I felt Astrid shiver. Goosebumps shot up her arms and we froze in the dark hall. Chanting echoed about the space, eerie and distant, and we all held our breath.

"I thought you said that this place was abandoned, Astrid?" Urien whispered.

"I thought it was. No one lives here."

"There may be a group of copycats that are trying to stir up trouble," Yra said, listening closely to the sound. "I can't understand what they're saying."

"We'll move quietly and handle this calmly. On my orders only." Urien looked in both directions. "Let's go right and see if we can figure out where it's coming from."

We moved as a group down the hall. The hallway was lined with crypts, most likely resting places for the family, and I strained my eyes to read the text on the slabs that covered them. We passed the grave of Kenton Hopson, and his wife. Then I saw them. The crypts on the other side of the hall read Rosemarie and Viggo.

"Hey," I whispered. "The crypts for those kids are down here."

"We can worry about empty coffins later," Urien replied, "after we get rid of whatever is in this house."

Onward we stepped through the basement, into a dining room. Weird place to eat, but I won't judge. Astrid sighed as the door opened and we entered another dark space. "Darius, I can't see," she whispered.

Urien looked around the room and I held my breath. The stench of decay wafted around the space, and I covered my nose with my arm. "Urien," I asked, "can Astrid light a torch?"

"Go for it," he replied.

The hiss of fire crackled about the room as Astrid's torch ignited and the flames revealed a gruesome scene. The entire floor of the place was covered in Human remains, some merely skeletons and some still stinking with old decay. There were several ways out of the room, which was otherwise quiet, and I could see Urien deliberating on where to go next.

"I hate this place," Yra muttered under his breath.

We moved forward, across the room and over the bones, into another hallway, which branched out into several more hallways. Yra made some sort of grunting, irritated noise, but Urien held fast. The chanting grew louder as we followed the sound, but when we stopped in the hallway something hitched in our throats. Our breath turned cold, forming clouds of steam in the air, even mine, and Astrid shivered.

"Darius." She trembled and held my hand. "I don't like this place."

A slithering, slurping noise echoed through the halls and black, cloaked shapes rose up from the ground, one to our left and one straight ahead. I heard more slurping and presumably more shapes, though I could not see them.

"Astrid, get behind me," I commanded.

When Urien raised his hand, a deep humming shook the basement. A tattoo on the back of his hand glowed in the darkness and he reached into it, pulling a string of light from his skin. When the string broke and separated from his flesh, the thin line of light exploded and formed a drum-sized blade encircled in spikes in his hand. The blade launched down the hall toward one of the cloaked figures, leaving a trail of glowing light behind it as it went.

It sliced through the first figure and then ricocheted around the corner. It connected with something I could not see, and the ghastly figures cried out. I did my best to see who they were. On their chests, an emblem had been carved into their skin. An eclipsed sun and stars dotted their flesh, some of our assailants masculine and others feminine, but chests exposed regardless of body type. It seemed to be a mockery of Ohaldin and Oris, the local sun and moon deities, but I could not be sure. One of the shadow men flew down the hallway past its counterpart and swung at me with sharp fingers. I dodged out of the way and ducked, pushing Astrid aside to keep her from taking the blow.

With an arm extended, I pointed down the hallway at the two figures I could see, shouting a curse in my native tongue. "Gobna!"

A ball of flame shot down the hallway, and the creatures were torched instantaneously, their cloaks catching fire and burning into nothingness. One of the monsters down the other hallway came at Urien, pale jaw dripping with black saliva. It threw itself at Urien, attempting to bite him, but Urien was able to hold it off.

Astrid flicked her wrist at the creature trying to bite into Urien's neck and mimicked my spell. "Gobna!"

Blue flame sparked on the ghoul's clothes and caught the monster on fire, destroying it in a burst of smoke and flame just as I had done the others. Her spell had not been as powerful as mine, but effective still. Only one remained and Yra drew his thin blade, boredom on his placid face. He lunged at the last creature, just beyond Urien's reach, and struck. The cloak writhed and shuddered, and then fell to the ground in a heap.

All of us let out a sigh of relief as Urien caught his spectral weapon, stowing it back in his skin. "Keep your eyes out for anything else like that," he whispered. "We don't want to get jumped."

"Astrid!" I exclaimed and gave her a squeeze on her shoulder. "That was perfect! You did such a good job!"

"Thank you, Darius," she beamed. "I have that spell in my book, too."

"Can we just get a move on before you two make me sick?" Yra complained.

Urien bent down to investigate the cloak that had fallen to the ground for a moment as we caught our breath. In truth, I hated fighting. I was nothing like my brother in that regard. I grasped the amulet around my neck in nervousness, rubbing my thumb over the ruby gemstone there. I just wanted out of this place, now. Something tied a knot in my stomach.

"Just a moment," Urien looked to his right, where the chanting was the loudest. "I recognize this crest. A rich woman in Nessden, Lady Dalca, was running a cult there. She had convinced a group of townspeople that an imp she befriended could produce riches, that a dark summoner had brought it there. They worshiped the imp and the supposed summoner, and they had worn this symbol on their clothes."

"What of the woman?" Yra asked.

"We killed her in her sleep."

"Brutal."

"Her cult was tearing Nessden apart. It had to be done. She was a threat to democracy and was turning the people against their burgomaster. He wasn't much better, but... anything's better than a murderous death cult."

"We should keep moving," Astrid whispered. "This place gives me the creeps."

We all gazed down into the dark hallway, and I let out a deep sigh. "Into the belly of the beast, then."

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