Draith
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Chapter 57 - Writing it Down
🕑 Added 2025-03-27 14:00:18 +0000 UTCBevel recovered herself a few minutes later, quietly wiping her eyes.
Neither Calbern or I said anything. While she’d been crying, I’d been studying the golems’s runes. The easy shutdown being triggered by electric shock meant I didn’t need to understand most of the work to add a few extra runes to keep them in standby. It took nearly an hour to lay the new runes into place. As I did so Bevel moved to my side, glancing between me and the new runes, a frown forming.
So, I explained exactly what I was doing.
“So they’ll stay sleeping until you can fix them?” Bevel asked, a glint in her eyes as she rubbed her sleeve against her face one last time.
“I… that’s the plan,” I agreed, lifting my scribing pen away from soap bottle’s back. Then I got up and moved over to the one she’d been crying over earlier. I probably should’ve started with her, but I wanted Bevel to get used to the idea first. As I lifted the pen into place, sending magic through it, I asked, “Do you know her name?”
“Keira,” Bevel muttered, reaching down to brush the stiff hair carved of non-moving stone. I thought it was a good sign that Bevel remembered her sister’s name. Maybe she’d remember her own name. Not that I minded calling her Bevel.
Other than answering some questions about the changes I had to make for each of the attendants, due to small differences in their rune networks, we didn’t speak again as I finished my patchjob to keep the golem attendants asleep.
It was only as Calbern and I were dragging them slowly to the side of the room, laying several of the extra towels over them to preserve their dignity, that Bevel stepped forward. She reached under Keira’s chin, folding the towel and tucking it in around the sides. After nearly a minute of fussing, Bevel stepped back, nodding to herself.
With that done, we continued our exploration of the tower, though the mood had shifted somewhat. There was less awe, but also less tension. At least, that was how it felt to me.
After the bath, coming across the series of labs was somehow less shocking than I would’ve expected. Unlike the essence refining room and the bathing chamber, these were unguarded. That didn’t mean they were unoccupied, however.
In the first room, a body floated in a tank, its features obscured by the thick purple fluid it was suspended in. When I stepped closer, the figure within twitched.
I leaped back, already pulling the mana I’d need for another reduced lightning bolt, but the twitch was its only movement. Stepping forward once more, this time it didn’t react. Upon closer inspection of the figure, I doubted it had even known I was there.
“Superb reaction, master Perth,” Calbern said, inclining his head slightly towards the tank. “It seems we’ve yet to find the limit of Dominus Balthum’s experiments.”
“And these are just the ones he thought were safe enough to keep near his home. Who knows what sort of secret lairs he established,” I said, pulling out a journal from a nearby shelf. It was a series of records, all of which discussed the subject in the tank.
I flipped through the book, trying to get a feel for what Balthum had been doing. Most of the records were formulaic, noting changes in essence levels, the caloric intake of the tank occupant, along with their heart rate, breathing patterns and several other measurements I couldn’t decipher at a glance. If not for my time with the extra manuals for car repairs I’d read over the years, I would’ve been lost in seconds. Balthum’s notes had nothing on a corporation’s need to change things every year just so their customers had to spend a few more bucks on parts and maintenance.
After a few minutes reading, I discovered a note in the margins that mentioned a previous experiment that had concluded satisfactorily. Opening up the referenced record and flipping to the end, I found the answer I was looking for. The tank was part of his golem creation process. Calbern stepped closer when I let out a thoughtful hum, so I shared my discovery. “See this? If I’m reading it right, that fluid is supposed to slowly transform the occupant into stone.”
“Should we free them, then, master Perth?” Calbern asked, looking over the control array beside me. “It hardly seems fitting to leave another person to such a fate.”
“What if they’re like Keira?” Bevel asked, shivering as she stepped behind us, peering into the tank. “And they go mad and try to kill us?”
“A valid point,” I said, flipping between the two books. “It looks like the person inside the tank was already near the end of the process when Balthum disappeared. Normally they’d have been removed… if this is correct, eleven years ago.”
“They’ve been trapped inside for years?” Bevel asked, her voice low as she stepped out from behind us.
“That’s what it says,” I replied as I shared a look with Calbern. “I don’t think I can just leave them here.”
“I will escort the young lady out,” Calbern said.
“No. We’ll release them, but…” I sighed as I rubbed the bridge of my nose. “But first I need to make sure I’m not going to kill them by doing so. And before I can focus on that, we need to make sure there isn’t anything else at large in the mountain.”
“Of course, master Perth,” Calbern agreed.
I moved towards the stairs, but Bevel was still lingering back by the console.
“Bevel?” I asked, looking back at her.
She didn’t say anything, but she came closer, taking Calbern’s hand and following us. There were three more chambers similar to the first, but the occupants of the tanks had died long ago. For two, the enchantments Balthum had created to ensure they were fed had failed, and the third had shattered their tank and lay half sprawled out across the floor, their body an uneven mixture of stone and flesh.
There was no smell, other than a faint medicinal odor I couldn’t place.
That didn’t stop Bevel from throwing up though.
As Bevel recovered from losing her lunch, Calbern and I laid what turned out to be a young woman to rest on the floor, covering her with a towel taken from the bath level.
I almost didn’t want to continue. And I was certainly regretting allowing Bevel to accompany us. Still, after she wiped her mouth clean once more, she stood tall, as if daring me to send her away.
I didn’t, though I resolved to check the rooms before allowing her entry.
It turned out my resolution came a bit late, the next room being a small bedroom, with a single small bed.
The stairs continued upward, leading to a final chamber. It was so different in design, it almost felt as though we’d stepped through one of the portals far beneath our feet. While small, barely large enough to hold the three of us, it was finely wrought stone. The lines were clean and precise, similar to the mage shaped chambers below. But where those lines had been simple and utilitarian, this chamber’s lines were embellished, with numerous swirls and shapes along every surface of the walls. They reminded me of runes, yet no magic flowed through them, and there were too many interfering patterns to function if it had.
They were simply decorative.
Yet it was where the small room led that truly stole our attention. For beyond that small room was the peak of the mountain. A simple platform ringed with a low stone fence. I could see the land falling away beyond the edge, and as we stepped out, I was surprised both by the warmth and the lack of wind.
Around us were six towering obelisks, the dark stone similar in design to the portals below, though in much better shape.
Not perfect though. Even as we stepped out, one of the obelisks crackled with sparks. Instantly, wind swept through. The temperature plummeted and the air grew so thin I couldn’t draw breath. Then it sparked again, the wind died down, and the temperature started climbing once more.
Still, it had been enough of a warning. “Back inside,” I said, receiving a quick nod from Calbern who’d already started hauling Bevel into the entry room before I’d spoken.
I moved inside behind them. As I did so, the obelisk sparked once more. My hand was still outside the door, and the cold hit it instantly even as the rest of me remained warm. “Seems there are hidden runes at work,” I said as I tested the invisible boundary, my hand passing through with no resistance except my own hesitation to plunge it into that biting cold.
“Masterful work,” Calbern noted, keeping himself between Bevel and the exit. “Though a bit fitful, it would seem.”
“It would seem,” I agreed, finally pulling my hand back and turning to the others. “And we seem to have run out of places to explore. Now for the part that makes it science instead of just playing around.”
“Which part is that?” Bevel asked, Calbern letting her step forward enough to stick her hand through the door. She leapt back from the biting cold, waving her hand back and forth.
I drew forth my journal, pen already primed. “Writing it down.”
Bevel rolled her eyes, but waited patiently as I put my words to action.
With the upper reaches of Balthum's hidden sanctum secure, we turned our attention downward. First we returned to the locked door across from the reading nook. It had a less complex spell lock than the door we'd tricked our way past, thought it still took me several minutes working with Calbern to decipher the missing components.
As the wooden door swung open, we found ourselves staring into a small library. The books were a good sign, however, the door at the far end of the room is what drew my attention.
It was as much skeleton as door, the upper frame formed of a dead monster's arms and shoulders, while the lower half showed more spikes than limbs. In the center was a massive head, with horns that extended to the sides of the six foot wide door. It was no cow or other herbivore though. Every one of its teeth were meant for tearing flesh, the pointed ends seeming to glisten with still wet blood.
When Bevel stepped forward, one hand stretching in its direction, the empty eye sockets lit with a purple flame.
I stepped up beside her, my hand on her shoulder to keep her from getting closer, squinting at the ugly thing.
Then it moved.
There was a slight shift along the edge, and then the face snapped forward a few inches, a far too long neck making itself known one skeletal segment at a time, as it shifted to look at us from above. A black tongue flicked over its sharp teeth as it assessed us.
"Ah!" Bevel screamed, jumping back. Calbern stepped forward, pulling her behind him as his hand rested on the hilt of his sword.
"Greetings," I tried while preparing lightning bolt and motioning Calbern back with one hand. The speed the neck had moved at implied we wouldn't have much time if this thing turned hostile.
The head swiveled in my direction, lowering itself, the purple flame in its eyes growing deeper. "Have you come to partake in the feast, young omnivore?"
Before I could ask for clarification, Bevel, peeking around Calbern's leg, asked, "What are you?"
"Ah, an excellent question, little omnivore," the skull said, lowering itself even further until it was at her level. "I am the Keeper."
"The keeper of what?" I asked, looking past the skull to where its body was embedded into the door behind it.
"Of many things delectable. The most tasty and tantalizing morsels," the skull replied, the purple light flashing brighter for a second before returning to its normal intensity.
"Candied meats?" Bevel asked, looking towards Calbern. "That means candied meats, right?"
"I am unsure, lady Bevel," Calbern replied, hand still gripping his sword.
The skull let out a deep laugh, one that shook the stone beneath our feet. "No, little omnivore, I do not speak of physical sustenance. While fruit and meat may fuel the body, it is the mind which I sustain." Once more, that black tongue flicked across its jagged teeth as its eyes blazed with purple light. "Knowledge is what I keep."
Comments
Eric Sweeney
Agreed. I thought that the mad wizard's death was recent. Was it retconned to being 10 years ago? But if that's the case, then wouldn't Bevel have to be much older?
RJD
Did he die 2 years ago or over 10vyears ago?
Jason Hardman
Are we going to have to deal with that old ethical dilemma of the fruit of knowledge from the tainted tree I wonder? TYFTC.
