David Farland - The Lair of Bones

“Downstream!” she said. “I think this cave meets an abandoned reaver tunnel downstream.” A feeling of doubt assailed her. It would be miles from here, dozens and dozens of miles, and in a cave such as this, the trail might easily be blocked a hundred times.

Gaborn got up, squinting and gasping. He rested his weight heavily on his reaver dart, used it as a crutch. The blow he had taken to his ribs obviously pained him. So he merely stood for a moment, as if to let his endowments of stamina and metabolism heal his broken bones.

As he did, the high hissing sound of frustration came from the grotto above. Averan could hear the reavers clanking the stone with their knight gigs, trying to gouge their way through. With every blow, the floor of the cave shook.

Gaborn peered at Binnesman. “Can you seal the cave behind us?”

“Collapse the roof? That would be foolhardy,” Binnesman said. “I don’t have that kind of control.” He thought for a moment, and added, “But perhaps a small spell is in order.”

He climbed back up the tunnel to the mouth of the grotto, and returned a moment later, obviously pleased with himself.

The reavers still hissed, but the ground shook somewhat less.

“Let’s get away from here,” he said.

“What did you do?” Averan asked.

“There is a simple spell for softening stone,” Binnesman explained. “That is how you make a roof collapse, or destroy a bridge. But it is similarly easy for an Earth Warden to harden the earth, to make dirt as flinty as stone, and stone as impenetrable as steel. I hope to keep those reavers busy digging for hours.”

“So, you locked the door behind us?” Gaborn asked.

“One can only hope,” Binnesman said.

Gaborn led the way, climbing over stalagmites and boxlike fungi, wading through tickle fern. He carried his reaver dart in one hand, and his pack and ropes slung over his back.

So they ran. Each of them had taken endowments of metabolism, which served them well. But of them all, Averan was still the slowest. Her nine-year-old legs were shorter than any others, and she had to take three steps for Gaborn’s every two.

She struggled to keep up at first. But soon, it was Gaborn who slowed his party. Though his endowments would heal the blow he had taken to the ribs, he still wheezed in pain, even as they slowed.

The channel went down, always down. Often there were places worn away where there had once been wide pools. Most pools were dry, but in some basins a bit of water had collected. Averan could see scrabbers—a kind of blind lizard with winglike arms—that seemed to fly beneath the water. She raced through such pools, splashing water everywhere, lest she get bitten.

In other places, the walls of the old river channel narrowed where water had rushed down, and thus the path was much clearer. There was little sign of animal life. Large green-gray cave slugs oozed about, feeding on the tickle fern, and these in turn provided sustenance for some small blind-crabs. But Averan saw nothing big in here, nothing dangerous.

We’re still far from the deep places, she thought. Still far from the perilous realms.

This was a desert. Most Underworld plants drew sustenance from heat, and it was too cold for much to grow here. Thus, there were no large animals about.

Even after they had run for miles, the ground still trembled and thundered from the passage of reavers. It was growing distant now.

They reached a narrows where stalactites hung from the ceiling in columns, and water dripped. Each person had to walk through the narrows in single file, and once they passed, Binnesman turned.

“Averan,” he said. “Let’s see if you can draw that rune I was telling you about.”

He traced the rune on the stone with his finger, leaving a tiny scratch mark.

“Now,” he said, “draw the rune with the point of your staff. And as you do, imagine your own strength, your own power, and the power of your staff fusing with the stone.”

Averan recognized the rune. She’d seen it many times, carved into stone blocks on houses and on castle walls. For a commoner, to carve such a rune was meaningless, a charm that he hoped might protect him from danger. But for an Earth Warden to draw such a rune, it could be a powerful spell.

Yet Averan also knew that not all Earth Wardens had the same powers. Binnesman could peer into stones and see things at great distances. But Averan had no skill with the seer stones. Similarly, she was discovering that she had powers Binnesman had never heard of.

Obviously, the old wizard was pushing her, hoping to discover Averan’s merits.

She closed her eyes. She drew the rune, almost by instinct, and sought to funnel all of her strength, all of her power into it, until she trembled from the effort.

Close for me, she whispered. Close for me.

She drew the rune, and then as if of its own volition, her staff drew three more squiggling lines within it.

And then Averan felt something strange. In an instant, it was as if all of her energy were inhaled.

Averan collapsed; everything went black.

When she woke, not much time seemed to have passed. Her head was spinning, and it felt as if someone had wrapped an iron band about it, and was pulling it tight. A deep pain ached, far back between her eyes. Gaborn stood over her, calling. “Averan! Averan, wake up!”

She looked around. Everyone was staring at her, or staring at the narrow wall. Binnesman stood before the pillars, studying them intensely.

“Are you all right?” Gaborn asked.

Averan tried to sit up, and felt weak as a mouse. Her arms seemed to be made of butter, and her legs would not move at all. If she had run all day without stopping, she would not have felt more overworn.

“I’m all right,” she said, struggling to sit up. She reached a seated position and the pain between her eyes deepened. Dizziness assailed her. She sat for a moment, unable to think, unable to focus.

Slowly, the strength returned to her muscles.

“Very good,” Binnesman said. “Very good, though I am afraid that it was a bit much for you. Would you like to see your handiwork?”

He stepped aside and Averan gasped.

The crack between the pillars was gone. Instead, the rock looked as if it had turned to mud and smeared together, only to harden afterward. The surface of the gray stone itself glistened, as if it had been fired in a kiln.

“What did I do?” Averan asked.

Binnesman shook his head in wonder, then laughed. “Certain sorcerers among the duskins could shape stone to their will. By that power, the great rift in Heredon was formed, and the continents divided. It is the rarest of all of the powers of the deep Earth. I have not heard of a human who ever possessed such skills, but it seems that you have it in some small degree.”

Averan gaped at the stone wall in shock.

Binnesman tapped it with his staff, listening as if for an echo. “This should hold them for a good while. Indeed, I suspect that the reavers may abandon any hope of breaking through, and instead be forced to dig around it. Let’s go.”

Averan made it to her feet. Everyone else ran ahead, but Binnesman stayed behind with Averan, keeping a watchful eye on her, as if afraid that she might fall again. She very nearly did, and if she had not had her staff to help her, she would have.

“When next we stop,” Binnesman said, “if you have the energy, we should practice this newfound skill of yours. But this time, we’ll try shaping something smaller.”

“All right,” Averan said, though in truth she didn’t feel as if she ever wanted to try it again.

After they had run only half a mile, the cave floor suddenly dropped away into oblivion.

The tunnel narrowed and the old watercourse dropped almost straight down, varying only slightly as it twisted this way and that.