James Wyatt - In the Claws of the Tiger

“Dania is far more sensitive to the realm of spirits than you or I, Janik. I believe she knows what she is doing.”

Auftane hurried along and caught up with them, pointing ahead to the end of the hall. “Excuse me,” he said, “but she seems to have found something.”

Dania had reached a door and thrown it open, revealing a staircase spiraling upward. She quickly reached the top of the stairs and pushed open a trap door in the ceiling, releasing a flood of argent light into the hallway. As Janik watched, she climbed through the trap door, a small dark shape silhouetted against the warm radiance, and disappeared. Cursing himself, Janik ran to catch up to her.

He stormed up the stairs and through the trap door, then stopped dead. Behind and below him, he heard Mathas gasp and Auftane swear quietly as they reached the top of the stairs.

They were at the pinnacle of the ziggurat, it was clear. Long, low windows set into the massive stone blocks offered them a spectacular view of the city around them and the desert beyond. Somehow, even the barren golden desert seemed vibrant and alive in what must have been midday sunshine-as if some spirit of the ancient jungle still remained, teeming with the life of its thousands of inhabitants.

The chamber was hard to see clearly in the intense brightness. Their eyes were accustomed to the dim light of Janik’s lantern in the dark passages, and the daylight alone would have made them blink and squint. Janik tried briefly to convince himself that the daylight was the source of the radiance that had spilled into the hallway below-but that did not explain its strange silver hue.

No-the stone chamber was on fire-blazing with silver flame, or perhaps the Silver Flame, for all Janik knew. Lines of argent fire covered the entire floor in an intricate pattern, like snakes twisted in endless coils. Where the lines crossed each other, they sometimes flared as high as Janik’s knees. Dania was kneeling in the midst of them, numerous tongues of flame caressing her, but she was clearly not in any pain.

Dania was on her knees, her body erect from her knees to her shoulders. Her head was thrown back, her helm lay on the floor beside her, and her arms were spread wide to her sides. Her eyes were open and seemed fixed on some point out the window ahead. Her face wore an expression of utter rapture.

The flames pulsed along the lines on the floor. The rhythm of its movement reminded Janik of the couatl’s flying dance, and he began to feel a connection. As he looked at the elaborate stonework in the chamber, he noticed serpent imagery everywhere-snakes ringed the windows, their heads meeting above the center, and the columns were shaped into majestic winged serpents.

What is this place? Janik thought. Why would a cult of giants and rakshasas dedicated to the imprisoned rajah build this shrine to the couatl that bound it?

As he resolved to pursue further research about serpent cults among the giants, the floor erupted into a storm of leaping flames. What had been tiny rivulets of fire exploded into blazing ribbons reaching almost as high as the ceiling, roaring like a hungry tiger. Janik drew his sword instinctively, and he felt Mathas and Auftane startled out of their own reveries.

Dania did not move.

The flames closed around her, forming a ring and then a column to engulf her. Janik started to rush forward, reaching out to grab her and heave her free of the fire before she was consumed, but the instant he touched her, the fire stopped. The column winked out, the lines on the floor went dark, and the daylight seemed dim by comparison.

Dania’s arms dropped to her sides and she slowly rose to her feet.

“Dania?” Janik said quietly, gently lifting her by the elbow. “Are you hurt?”

She stood, her head hanging limply and her hair covering her face. Slowly, she brought a hand up to her throat. She lifted her head to look at Janik, brushing her hair out of her face. His gaze fell first on a gleam of silver at her throat, a torc shaped like a twisting serpent coiled around her neck. He was quite sure it had not been there before the fire engulfed her.

Then her eyes met Janik’s, and he took a step back in surprise.

They had been a dusky blue, like the sky before a storm, but not any more. They were like pools of quicksilver, firmly focused on him and, he felt, seeing perhaps more than he would have liked.

She smiled, and her eyes glistened as she took his hands in hers. “I’m fine, Janik,” she said. She held his gaze for a moment longer, then her eyes settled on Mathas and Auftane, lingering for a moment on the dwarf before turning back to Janik. She raised a hand to touch his cheek and smiled at him again. “Do not let your heart be troubled, Janik. I have chosen this path, and I am not afraid.”

Janik had no idea what she meant, but there was a certainty in her gaze and her voice, and a warm comfort in her touch that eased the worry from his brow and softened the knot of anxiety in his heart.

“We need to move,” Dania said. “Krael and Sever have already entered the heart of the temple.”

Dania picked up her helmet and settled it on her head as Mathas and Janik shared a helpless glance. Auftane was distracted, staring out the window as he waited for Dania to lead the way.

She gripped her sword, and with a quick glance back to make sure the others were following, started down the stairs. She retraced their steps almost all the way back to the chamber where they had fought the giant, but led them instead to a steeply descending staircase. Another maze of passages greeted them on the lower level, but Dania led them with as much confidence as she had shown earlier-except this time, she kept glancing back to make sure her friends were following.

“We haven’t seen a single guard since we killed the giant,” Janik observed as they hurried after Dania, hustling to keep up with her purposeful strides.

“True,” Mathas said. “I’m not sure how to interpret that.”

“I know,” Janik said. Part of him was relieved-he wanted to reach Maija as quickly as possible, especially if there was any chance that Krael might kill her before they arrived. But he also worried. “I wonder if Maija-if the Fleshrender-called all the zakyas back to this ‘heart of the temple’ to defend her.”

“Not to mention more of those giants,” Auftane piped up from behind them.

“I had hoped no one would mention the giants,” Janik said with a grim smile. “That could be the end of it.”

“There is another possibility,” Mathas said. “Perhaps the Fleshrender is overconfident. It’s possible that it never considered that we might escape. Maybe we’ve already slain what few guards could be spared.”

“I prefer that possibility,” Janik said, “and for that reason, I doubt it.”

Dania stopped and looked over her shoulder at him, smiling. “Sometimes, Janik, the worst possibility is not the one that proves true.”

“Maybe so, but I find it’s generally better to prepare for the worst. Unless you’ve got information you haven’t shared, I’ll brace myself.”

“See for yourself,” Dania said, rounding a corner. They stopped before a towering stone door that yawned into an enormous vaulted chamber. An elaborate tracery of lines and symbols writhed over the floor, inlaid with a dull silver but echoing the lines of flame in the pinnacle chamber. A massive stone block stood at the center of the room, carved with snarling tiger faces-a motif also repeated in the carvings on the walls. A large stone tablet leaned against this block, which Janik presumed to be an altar. Runic symbols were carved into the surface of the tablet.

The ceiling gave off a dim red light that illuminated every corner, but darkness seemed to hang in the air despite that light, as if the shadows had substance. A palpable presence was in the chamber, brooding and malicious.