Richard Baker - Final Gate

“You will try one of the stairways?” Jorin asked.

“I hesitate to rely on a flying spell. If I wandered a little too far from the wall, I might become lost in the void, unable to find my way back to the side. And eventually my flying magic would be exhausted.” Araevin shrugged. “Besides, it seems to me that the stairs must lead somewhere. I would not be surprised to find that the second shard is there. It seems more likely to me that the shard would appear near some kind of feature, as opposed to a completely random spot on the floor of this great void.”

“If it has a floor,” Maresa interrupted.

“In any event, the shard is somewhere below, and the stairs lead down. If I don’t find the shard at the foot of the stairs, I’ll try my divining spells again. It’s merely a matter of persistence.”

“What about this Pale Queen the gnome whispered of?” Nesterin asked him. “He said that he climbed to escape from her. Descending the stairs would seem to lead us into her domain, whatever that might be.” The star elf glanced at the cairn of stones they had raised over the corpse. “It wasn’t the climb alone that killed poor Galdindormm. He was under the influence of some dark and deadly curse, I am sure of it. Neither you nor Donnor could break it, and that gives me no small amount of concern.”

“What if she has the shard?” Donnor rumbled. “If she is a being of knowledge and power, she would surely recognize the importance of the thing, wouldn’t she?”

Araevin nodded. “I think you are right, Donnor. I think I will find that this Selydra has the shard. Somehow I will have to get it from her.”

They set out back the way they had come, heading for the last staircase they had passed. Araevin guessed that it was not more than three or four miles behind them. After they had walked for a timeless period through the silent darkness of Lorosfyr they finally came to the squat, oddly shaped pillar that marked the place where the steep stairs plunged down into the unthinkable darkness. Araevin hesitated a moment, staring down at the steps, and he began to descend.

The stone steps were cut into a sloping notch or crease hewn out of the abyss’s wall. The staircase was about eight or nine feet in width, the steps about a foot tall and a foot deep. They were noticeably worn in the center, each step seeming to sag beneath the wear of the countless feet that must have passed that way-though who or what could have walked the dizzying path so frequently, Araevin could not say. He quickly realized that the simple act of descending the stairs required all of his attention. One careless step could result in an unimaginable fall. And it was more than a little physically demanding, so that not long after they started Araevin’s thighs and calves burned with the effort of the descent.

“The question that occurs to me,” Nesterin said softly as they shuffled and picked their way ever lower, “is how long it will take us to climb back up these stairs when we wish to leave. That is something I am not looking forward to.”

“Speak for yourself,” Maresa told him. “If climbing these damned stairs means leaving this place behind us, I think I’ll find a way to manage it.”

After a seemingly interminable descent, they came to a landing or switchback of a sort. Two more of the squared-off pillars marked the spot, each covered with more of the mysterious runes. The small company rested for a time at the landing, but it was bitterly cold, and their exertions had rendered them all too susceptible to the creeping numbness of the frigid stone and air. And worse yet, they were absolutely entombed in the dark-blackness above, blackness below, blackness all around them-with only a tiny little circle of cold and cheerless rock revealed by their inadequate lights. Araevin found himself entertaining the curious delusion that the world simply ended beyond their dim little sphere, and that the endless stairs were nothing more than an invention of the dark that faded back into nothingness once they had passed by. It was not a thought he cared for at all.

They tried to make a small meal of the rations they carried, but no one was very hungry. The weight of the abyss around them pressed close. Implacably silent, the stillness was like some awakened glacier of pure night. There was a conscious malevolence to the place that encouraged the mind to wander into despondency. After a time Araevin realized that the company had fallen still and silent again, straining to hear the sound of the darkness. Somehow he shook himself to motion again, and roused the rest.

“Come, my friends,” he said. “I think it is not good to stay here too long.”

“What did the gnome call this place? The Maddening Dark?” Jorin said. “I can see how it earned its name.”

They started down the next great turn of the stairs, and dropped farther and farther from the level of the road’s ledge. Each step jarred the legs until it seemed that the whole body dreaded the next footfall, but still they pressed on, winding deeper and deeper into the dark. Finally, when Araevin began to despair of seeing anything other than the few steps ahead and the few steps behind, the stairs reached a sort of broad ledge or shelf in the side of the abyss. It was impossible to see the full extent of the place, but strange old stone buildings brooded here in the darkness, guarding another switchback leading even farther down. Like the pillars above, the buildings were squat and square, with carefully worked geometric reliefs cut into the stones from which they were built.

“Some sort of guardhouse?” Donnor wondered aloud. “A watchpost to keep enemies from descending any deeper?”

“Whatever it is, it will have to serve as a campsite,” Araevin decided. “We’ve been descending for too long, and this is the only shelter we’ve come across. I think we should rest before we attempt the next turn of the stair.”

Nesterin studied the silent ruins looming up out of the lightlessness around them. “It seems an ill-omened place to me, Araevin.”

“I know, but I don’t want to be forced to make camp in the middle of the stairs. This will have to do.” Araevin chose a structure that backed against the wall of the abyss, as opposed to one that stood on the open side of the ledge, and carefully peered into the square doorway. The chamber within was empty and cheerless, but at least the floor was level and it did not offer the opportunity to miss a step and plummet to one’s death. “We’ll sleep here, and press on when we’re more rested.”

5 Eleasias, the Year of Lightning Storms

Lord Miklos Selkirk sent for Ilsevele early in the morning of their third day in Tegal’s Mark. A finely dressed Sembian officer delivered the news, requesting Lady Miritar and her retainers to follow him to the Sharburg-the town’s small keep-after they had breakfasted and dressed. Ilsevele accepted the invitation with a gracious nod, and saw the courier to the suite’s door.

After he withdrew, she turned to Fflar and said, “Well, it seems that Lord Selkirk has returned.”

“I was beginning to wonder if the Sembians wanted to talk with us or not,” he answered. In fact, he had found himself wondering whether the Sembians intended to hear them out at all.

“I trust there has been a good reason for the delay. Until I know otherwise, I choose to believe that our host has been absent.” Ilsevele withdrew to her bedchamber to change, while Fflar found a handsome blue cloak to throw over his own tunic. Ilsevele soon emerged from her room, attired in a beautiful gold-embroidered dress of deep green over a chemise of sheer pale gray silk. Her long red hair was free to her shoulders, wavy and alluring, and she wore a slim tiara on her brow. The dress went well with her eyes, Fflar decided. Very well indeed. He couldn’t recall ever having seen Ilsevele dressed up, and the effect was stunning.