Chapter 4: Disaster Beneath the Earth

Mala was surprised to see me when I disembarked from the galley. 

 “Things got complicated today,” I told her. “But I have to return Bardrakeu’s key.”

“This is the last water shuttle for the day. How will you get home?”

 I smiled. “I’ll walk. But don’t be surprised if I’m not back at the apartment till after you’ve retired. I have work to do.”

 “Maybe I should stay too…”

 “No, Mala. Just see if you can decipher the ingredients to those powders.”

 “Are you sure? I thought we made a nice team the other night.”

 I placed a hand on her shoulder. “You’re not trained for this. I don’t need you risking your life unnecessarily.”

 Her eyes went wide and seemed to droop. She smiled slightly, nodded, and joined the line of people filing up the gangplank. 

 Bardrakeu’s family villa proved to be locked up and silent as the catacombs it rested over.

 There was one way of getting inside. I considered the possibility of breaking in using the underground tunnels. And I had the mask and hooded cloak to conceal my features.

 It all seemed a bit much just to return a key in the hopes that none of the people at the villa were missing it already.

 Regardless, I needed to get to the campus grounds before they posted a guard. 

 Perched atop the coiled serpent, the Celestial Lord and Lady stared lovingly into each other’s eyes before closing in for a kiss. Suhodeton had lived two centuries ago, I mused. Just how many times had brother and sister shown affection on this campus? A thousand times? Ten thousand? A million? The Equoci insisted the Samarthoph Mother Goddess had eaten babies. Yet the Equoci themselves celebrated the taboo union of their own gods. (Or was their incest supposed to explain the world’s woes?)

 I looked around the wide quadrangle and saw few people. I’d considered hiding out in one of the buildings till the sun had set, but I wanted to get into the catacombs before the Sepulchral Giant’s minions surfaced. 

 I set my cloth sack next to the coiled base of the automaton, slipped the hood over my head, and riffled through the bag till my hands wrapped around the coiled rope. I slid a hand over the rope till my fingers touched cold metal and then slowly pulled out the three-clawed hook that the Giant’s servants had used to secure the rope to one of the Celestial Lord’s legs. 

 Nervously, I glanced about me to make sure I wasn’t being watched. The courtyard seemed fairly empty at this moment.

 I let the hook slide out of my hand enough to give me about half a foot’s length of rope and then started twirling it over my head. I sighted the Celestial Lord’s leg, spinning the hook and length of rope even faster. Then I flung the metal end skyward and it arced over the coils of the snake and the god’s thigh. There was a clinking. 

 I pulled the rope, causing the hook to scrape along the automaton until it caught on the Celestial Lord’s leg. Then I tugged to make sure it was secured before jumping onto the lowest flank of the serpent and working hand over hand to pull myself up the rope, my boot soles walking along a curved wall of metallic scales.

 This whole endeavor took me about ten minutes (which seemed longer with my head constantly glancing back to check for witnesses) but I eventually made it to the top of the god’s leg.

 Just then, he sat forward to give his sister a kiss, and I had to crouch down so that I wouldn’t be crushed.

 Getting down the well was a lot easier since I had gravity on my side. I repelled down the circular stone wall. The intricate mesh of water pipes gave my boots more purchase than they had running up the side of the snake.

 When I reached the flagstones at the well’s bottom I surveyed my surroundings. The sun’s waning golden rays lit the eastern side of the stone shaft. It made sense if the sun was setting in the west.

 Staring at the sunlit stones, I suddenly noticed a figure behind the scaffolding of pipes.

 He was a tall man, definitively bigger than Fodineo’s description of the Sepulchral Giant, and he stared at me from behind the pipes with large, sad, brown eyes. His black curly locks were crowned with a laurel. In front of the right breast of his purple robe was a hand holding a scepter with thin, tapered fingers. He was very faded and the paint had come off of him in chips all over so that he looked like he was standing behind a curtain of snowflakes.

 I gasped.

 This must be the remains of his tomb. Monarch of the old Samarthoph city-state and the setting sun lighted his forlorn features. I realized that his placement was deliberate.

 I looked up as the Celestial Siblings blotted the king out with their affections. There must have been a ceiling here before Suhodenton’s automaton was built over this chamber. And it probably had windows to light the place of the dead king.

 I took a tinderbox from my belt pouch, then removed a torch from the bag on my back and lit it. The Celestial Couple parted again and now I had light from two sources. 

 Re-examining the painted king, I now noticed a faint green band encircling him. Yes, it was definitely the Cosmic Mother worshiped by these bygone people. Her head was atop the ring of her body and she was biting her own tail. 

 And now I realized that some of the white spots I’d initially believed to be missing paint were actually stars. I’d only gotten a partial overview of the Samarthoph zodiac from the library scroll, but this had to be it.

 Bardrakeu had mentioned that the serpent of the chaos sea had its skin strung up over the void to form the Divine Diamond Highway. Maybe this was what I was looking at.

 The Equoci must have pilfered elements of the Samartoph religion for their own faith. The Cosmic Mother encircled the universe and held at bay the chaos beyond.

 All of these clues had to add up to some sort of answer, but what that might be I currently couldn’t guess. Somewhere down in these grim and dark catacombs the Sepulchral Giant was pondering that same elusive answer. But why?

 Perplexed, I let my breath whistle through my teeth.

 Bardrakeu would be missing his key, and I knew one way to enter his locked house. Holding my torch aloft, I forged ahead into the catacombs.

 My first concern was checking the corpses Mala and I had placed under the stone table in the skull-lined corridor. When I reached it I knelt down and held my torch just below my face. The space beneath was empty. My blood turned to ice-water. Calm down, I thought. Maybe this is the wrong table. Then I noticed flakes of ash on the flagstones-- that had to have come from the remains of the man Mala had set on fire.

 So maybe they had found the bodies. And here I was down in their territory dressed as one of them. Not quite. 

 I reached into the bag slung over my shoulder and produced the shiny black mask. I fastened the disguise over my eyes, pulled my hilted sword out of the bag, and strapped it onto my back.

 I picked up the torch and crept along the curving corridor, ever alert for any other visitors. The dancing shadows on the gaily painted skulls made the dead Samartoph look animated and alive, but they seemed my only real company.

 Soon I reached the fork in the tunnel Mala and I had encountered the evening of the party. Tempted as I was to rush down that alternate tunnel, my time-tested blade at the ready, I knew I should return the wine cellar key before Bardrakeu or his servants could enter the villa and note its absence. 

 As I passed that unexplored tunnel I cast furtive glances back in its direction. No one seemed to be creeping out of its shadowed maw, though, and I kept my quiet, steady pace.

 Eventually, I came upon the spiraling serpentine fresco of the Cosmic Mother with the world egg in her jaws. More than likely there were different artist interpretations of how she guarded the universe, I thought. It wasn’t much longer before I came upon the gray curtain that marked the end of the catacombs and the beginning of the wine cellar. As my torchlight grew upon its wrinkled folds I could see why some people foolish enough to come down here might mistake it for a dead end.

 I reached a hand to one end of the curtain and pulled it aside just enough to peek into the wine cellar. It was dark and silent. I opened the curtain wider and slid in, careful not to let my torch flame brush against the cloth. 

 The cellar was as Mala and I had left it, the table still pushed up against the door. Good, then maybe they hadn’t yet missed the key.

 I re-sheathed my sword and placed my torch on the stone floor between the two sets of wine racks. Then I approached the table, grabbed one end with both hands, and slowly pulled it back to the center of the room. Now that my hands were free again I eased my blade out of the scabbard on my back, retrieved my torch, and headed for the door. 

 I wasn’t sure if anyone was home or not, so I tamped out my torch on the stone floor and then slid it under my belt before I took hold of the metal of the door handle and gently pushed into the next room. It was pitch black now, so I reached a hand across till it brushed the stones of a wall and then inched forward in the direction of the stairs.

 My cautiousness was for naught, though, because when my boots touched the lowest step, I still managed to lurch forward before collapsing on the stairs. My sword clanged on the stone steps. Probably shouldn’t have put the torch out so soon, I thought, pulling myself up and brushing my banged knees. 

 “What was that?”

 The voice came from somewhere above. Maybe I should just sneak back into the wine cellar, slip through the curtain, and then relight my torch before heading back to the campus.

 I had only enough time to consider this option when the door at the head of the stairs opened and a shadowy figure holding a glowing candle stared down at me.

 Now what?

 “You? What are you doing here?”

 The voice was definitely a man’s, and it was one I recognized. Nebiat, the butler.

 Should I answer his question? No, it was obvious he recognized my cloak and mask.

 “Nebiat, who are you talking to?”

 The second voice was Bardrakeu.

 I considered turning and slamming the door behind me. I slowly backed up till my hand brushed the cold metal of the door handle.

 A new figure came into the open doorway above me. 

 “What?” Bardrakeu called out. “Who are you?”

 My hand grabbed the handle and I turned and flung open the wine cellar door. 

 “Come back here!” said Bardrakeu.

 I rushed through the open doorway and into the darkened wine cellar. There was no time to light my torch so I quickly walked to the side with outstretched hand. When my fingers grazed the sidewall I ran forward, my gloved hand using the cellar stones as a guide.

 Then I slammed into wine racks. I felt like a fool.

 I heard the door open and turned to see Bardrakeu, a flickering torch in one hand and a sword in the other.

 “Stop right where you are, thief!”

 With his light illuminating the wine cellar I could now see where I was and considered making a dash for the curtain at the far end of the room.

 But Bardrakeu ran up to where I was pinned with my back against the wine racks. I had no choice but to engage him with my blade.

 I jabbed my sword at his arm, hoping to just poke him enough to make him drop his weapon, but he quickly parried my attack. Our steel locked and I suddenly realized the wine rack I was pressed against would make it difficult to disengage. My free hand reached back and grabbed a wooden post. I pulled at it and to my satisfaction the rack behind me tipped over.

 Bottles slid out of their cubby holes and smashed on the flagstones in a cacophony of shattering glass. Immediately after, the wooden shelving collapsed onto the shards with a loud bang. 

 Bardrakeu’s eyes went wide and he screamed.

 I didn’t dare turn my back to him in the hope of running across the downed wine rack and through the curtain. He was practically pressed against me, so I jerked my leg up between his legs and kneed him in the groin.

 Groaning, he doubled over.

 I shot my free hand at his sword arm and locked my fingers on his wrist.

 Afraid of being disarmed by a sword-wielding assailant, Bardrakeu jabbed my leg with his torch.

 I felt the worst pain in my life as the firebrand singed the leather of my pant leg and burned my skin.

 I screamed in agony, slammed into Bardrakeu, and knocked him on his back. His body hit the flagstones with a loud splashing and I ran over him and headed to the door. I was about to open it when I noticed the wine sloshing my boot soles. If Bardrakeu should drop his torch, that wine would ignite and he would become kindling. I turned my head in his direction. 

 Bardrakeu had his back to me and was trying to push himself off the floor with his sword hand, the torch guttering as it bobbed dangerously over the flammable liquid. Just one stray ember could set this young man ablaze. I rushed him, tearing the torch from his hand and pushing the back of his head forward with the flat of my blade. He tumbled and splashed into the ever-rising sea of red wine. 

 I turned my back on his gasps and cries and sloshed my way to the door. Yanking it open, I rushed out and slammed it shut. I gasped rapidly, my skin drenched in sweat, my boots covered in wine, and my leg stinging with sharp, sharp pain. I pressed my back against the door and looked up at the open exit at the head of the stairs.

 Nebiat’s silhouette filled the entrance. “Come quickly,” he said.

 Should I trust him?

 I felt Bardrakeu bang his fist into the door from the other side. He started fumbling with the latch. 

 I needed a free hand so I re-sheathed my sword. Grabbing at the small bag on my belt, I reached my fingers in till they touched the keyring. I pulled it out and desperately fumbled with the lock till I was able to jam metal into the keyhole. There was a clicking sound as the bar slid into place, locking Bardrakeu inside.

 He must have heard the door lock because his pounding intensified and he began yelling: “Let me out!”

 I tamped the torch out against the stones of the wall. Then I crossed the room and began climbing the stairs, my leg screaming in pain as I strained its muscles with every step. The ascent was laborious and my breathing became heavier as the sensation of burning pain increased. 

 Finally, I reached the top.

 Nebiat took my arm in his hand and pulled me through the open doorway. “What happened?”

 “He burnt my leg,” I gasped in a whisper.

 “We have little time before you need to leave. I blew sleeping powder into the guard’s face and he’ll be unconscious for at least an hour. But come. I have a burn ointment I can apply to your leg, which should lessen your pain. Then I’ll show you an exit into the woods.”

 He slid an arm around me to support my sagging frame and guided me to the living room. There, he sat me on a divan and cut open the burnt part of my pant leg with a dagger. He produced a small clay jar from a bag at his belt, dipped his fingers into it and removed a grayish white cream which he rubbed into the charred flesh of my leg. There was a cool burning on my singed wound, followed by a prickling numbness.

 Nebiat then escorted me to what appeared to be a pantry in the kitchen. He pushed on the back wall of the small room and it gave way, exposing a dim tunnel.

 “Just follow that till you see stars,” he said.

 “Thank you,” I whispered, handing him the wine cellar key.

 His eyes rose in surprise. “It was a mistake for you to come here. Go now. The Sepulchral Giant’s time will be here soon and then we all will all be free.”

 I wasn’t sure if handing him the key gave Nebiat any clue as to my true identity. We hadn’t talked at the party, my mask and my hood concealed most of my face, and my leather gloves obscured the dark complexion of the hand returning his most entrusted item.

 He had to have heard the shattering wine bottles and smelled the alcohol on my clothes. In one short instant I had ruined most of his profession.

 “I’m sorry about the wine,” I whispered.

 Nebiat stared at the floor, took in a deep breath, and slowly hissed air through clenched teeth. “Yes. This was a terrible error. But too much is at stake. We serve a greater cause. Please, just go, already.”

 I turned from the butler and stepped into darkness. 

 “Syndeeka! Wake up.”

 I opened my eyes to find Mala kneeling on the concrete embarkation point and holding my arms. Behind her was the water shuttle with raised oars and lowered gangplank and exiting passengers.

 That’s right, I remembered. I’d felt so exhausted from climbing the steps to the top of the aqueduct that I’d decided to just sit down and rest through the night until sunrise.

 Several people disembarking from the longboat stopped to gawk at me. 

 Mala looked back to them and said, “She had too much to drink last night. She’ll be fine.”

 The gawkers bought her story and continued on their way.

 “Mala,” I said, rubbing my scalp. “I made the mistake of trying to return the wine cellar key to Bardrakeu’s house. I came in through the catacombs and he thought I was a burglar.”

 Mala took the black mask from my lap and examined it. “Oh. Was he in the wine cellar when you came through the curtain?”

 “Uh, no. He caught me on my way up the steps.”

 Mala’s eyebrows arched in surprise. “Why didn’t you just leave the key on the table in the wine cellar and then go back into the catacombs?”

 I laughed weakly. “I thought it would look suspicious if they just found the key on the table down there. After all, we’d used the table to block the door so they would have assumed it was locked.”

 “And the door can only be locked from the outside, right?”

 “Yes.”

 “Syndeeka! Sometimes you’re too smart for your own good.”