“Well,” the dwarf sputtered. “Perhaps not exactly shoulder to shoulder as the dwarven shoulders were always considerably lower than those of the humans, but I speak metaphorically. Even so, this is a place of dreaded power for the elves. Were it not for the special keywords to which I alone am privy, this innocent looking portal would blast us with the power of the gods themselves were we but to dare pass its threshold unbidden! Fear not, my good companions, for though you would suffer the most painful of curses otherwise, I shall. . I shall. . where are you going?”
Drakis turned to follow the dwarf’s gaze.
The Lyric stepped quickly through the portal, her lithe figure swallowed almost at once by the darkness. Peels of her bubbling laughter echoed from within.
“Nasty dwarven curse, that,” Ethis said in flat tones.
The dwarf sputtered. “But I. . I don’t. .”
Drakis reached down wearily behind him and pulled Mala up from where she had collapsus to the ground. The House tattoo on her beautiful bald head was already being obscured by a fuzz of rust-colored hair emerging from her scalp. Her smudged face accentuated the exhaustion in her eyes. She looked hard, resentful, as she shrugged her own field pack higher on her shoulders, and he wondered for a moment what had happened to the bright face and the easy smile that he had seen so often in his dreams and his waking hours as well. She was so different now, so much less than he remembered, so much pain and loss, so common, so. . real.
Nine notes. . Seven notes. .
The heart of the warrior is not his. .
It beats for another’s soul. .
They had awakened from both a dream and a nightmare all at once when the Aether Well fell with the House of Timuran. They had left their innocence behind and now, eyes opened, found the reality of their lives to be a nightmare, too. He no longer knew the woman whose hand he held with such unthinking devotion, but he held it just the same out of a hope for the shadows he had once believed were true. He was a creature of honor and of duty though he no longer understood what honor he pursued nor to whom his duty remained. All he knew with certainty was that he once loved Mala-if not the woman that he no longer knew, then the ideal of her-and that, for all he knew, was what his honor and duty were about.
They stepped through the opening and nearly ran at once into a stone wall. His eyes were still adjusting from the light of the setting sun, and he could make out a glow to his left. He felt along the rock face, his right hand in front of him as he pulled Mala behind him with his left. The wall ended abruptly beneath his fingers where the glow was, and Drakis turned the corner.
The warrior’s grim face relaxed into awestruck wonder.
The entire stone hill was hollowed into an enormous dome surrounding a magnificent central fountain. Luminous waters cascaded from the top of the ornate spout, fashioned from the purest white marble to resemble the branches of a tree. The skill of its artisans insured that the water splashed in its descent to appear as the foliage of the tree, ever living and moving as the water fell down to where its stone roots gripped the floor of a wide, shining pool. The shimmering light from the surface of the waters played across the detailed carvings of enormous trees, hewn in relief from the encircling stone with intricate detail, their own branches interlacing in the dome above them. The movement of the light occasionally revealed figures in the carvings: faeries and sprites that seemed to form just at the fringes of his vision, nymphs that danced for a moment and then vanished, dryads that smiled back at him and then could no longer be seen at all. There were the unmistakable marks of age in the cavern, for it had long been untended, yet its beauty remained.
Jugar stepped up next to Drakis, his head hung in dejection. “I wanted you to see it in all its glory. There were gems, lad. . gems as big as your fist and more gold and silver than a soul could see in a lifetime. But the tomb has been despoiled and its riches taken by thieves. . oh, lad, I’m so sorry.”
“You’re wrong, dwarf,” Drakis said in a whisper.
“How then?”
“The riches are still here,” he said with a gentle smile. Drakis stepped carefully into the enormous chamber, his eyes gazing in reverent joy at the wonders around him.
“Welcome, my brave friends!”
Drakis turned with some reluctance from the glorious, magical carvings on the walls toward the deep, sultry voice now carrying through the hall. It came from the shining fountain tree, and for a moment he wondered if the tree itself had spoken to them.
The soaked form of the Lyric emerged from the nimbus of water. She had abandoned her field pack next to the pool. Now her wet dress clung to her body as she moved, revealing a strong and beautiful form that Drakis would not have supposed her to possess. She was transformed; her narrow chin was raised in elegant poise, and she carried her chest high and shoulders back so that a regal curve formed down her spine. She held her arms away from her body and bowed gracefully until the tips of her fingers lingered near her strong thighs. Drops of the water sparkled and shone in the white bristles of her emerging hair.
“I thank you all,” the Lyric said in a deep, sleepy voice. “Together we shall triumph. Together we shall be free!”
Mala stepped out from behind Drakis, her questioning eyes fixed on the majestic form standing in the water. “Lyric?”