Stephen Deas: The Black Mausoleum

‘Vish. When you were here — how big was this place?’

Vish shrugged. ‘Huge. They took us on a boat that way.’ He pointed. Skjorl’s best guess was he was pointing towards Bloodsalt Lake. ‘Didn’t see all of it either.’

‘Where did you get in.’

‘Up there.’ Except up there was nothing but shadows. ‘There’s a passage that used to lead into the old fort in the middle of the city.’

‘Any other ways?’

Vish shrugged. ‘Lots, I expect. The cisterns run all over the city. No one builds upwards here. No tall towers. Nowhere to get the stone, apparently. They all dig down. Every house has its own cellar. Helps keep it nice and cool. A lot of them have tunnels that lead to the cisterns, if they haven’t all caved in.’

Skjorl got on with smashing eggs. Tunnels were good. A man could hide in a tunnel. As long as there were no hatchlings in it.

‘Skjorl! Movement!’ The shout came from Jasaan, almost down the rope, ripping over the sounds of the axes. He was pointing. At the edge of their light an egg had toppled over.

For a faint moment Skjorl froze. Movement meant…

Jex and Vish were already running and Skjorl ran too, axes held high. The egg rolled again. Cracked. Jex was a dozen paces away, Skjorl much the same.

The end fell off the egg. A nose, a head, two eyes, closed and blind. A neck. Skjorl hurled himself across the last few yards. Brought the axe down. Didn’t hesitate. Dragons didn’t give second chances.

The dragon opened its eyes. Looked right at him almost like it had seen him once before. And then the eyes closed again and fell back, its neck cleaved apart. Jex and Vish looked at him and Skjorl looked back. They were all breathing hard but they froze for a moment anyway. Listening.

Jasaan reached them. ‘Wha-’ A hand over his mouth from Vish.

They stood in silence.

‘What?’ hissed Jasaan.

Skjorl shook his head. He looked at Jasaan. ‘Get in the harness and get out. Jex, you first. Then Vish, then Jasaan, then me. If we’re lucky, we got it quick enough. If we’re not, the adults felt it die and we’re done for if we stay here.’

‘What?’ If Jasaan could have furrowed his brow any further, his eyebrows were going to touch his nose.

‘They didn’t teach you much at Sand then, eh? Its eyes opened. It saw us. Maybe we got it fast enough the big ones didn’t get a warning; maybe we didn’t. Get on with it. Quick. Smash what you can while you’re waiting and then let’s get out of here.’ Making Jasaan the last man out ahead of him again. Turning into a habit, that was. As if there wasn’t already enough trouble between them.

He watched Jex get into the harness. Watched Kasern and Relk and Marran haul him up. For a moment he paused from hacking at an egg. He leaned against one of the pillars that held up the roof.

And felt a tremor through the stone. And then another and then another and another. Footsteps. Dragon-sized. Shit!

‘Dragon!’ he roared. Jex was at the top. They were getting him out of the harness. Vish had shouldered his axe, waiting for it to come back down.

The ground shook. Skjorl felt it through his feet this time. A different kind of shudder. A second dragon. There was one up above them somewhere and now there was one down in the cist-

‘Lights out! Now! Then run!’ He fumbled for his own firebox, snuffing the wick with his fingers and never mind how much that hurt. The last he saw was the harness, coming back down for Vish. The whole floor was shaking now. He could taste dust in the air.

Sounds of something smashing, of stones shattered and falling. Where the covered canal had fed into the wall, where Jex and Relk and the others had been only a moment ago, Skjorl saw a patch of darkness that wasn’t quite black. Stars. He was seeing stars. He was seeing the sky.

Then something blotted them out. Filled the hole. And as he looked away, the fire started.

Twenty-three days before the Black Mausoleum

‘He can’t walk.’ The Adamantine Man was looking down at Rat, his face saying loudly that he couldn’t care less.

‘Then you have to carry him.’

‘What’s the point? He’ll be dead in a few days.’ He did what he was told, though: he picked the outsider up and slung him over his shoulder. Rat groaned.

‘No. You’re going to keep him alive just like you’re going to keep me alive. We need him.’

‘To do what?’

Kataros ignored him. He was obedient — that was all that mattered — and she’d never said anything about not asking questions. ‘How do we get out of here without being caught?’ The Adamantine Man shrugged. ‘You don’t know?’

‘No.’

She thought about that for a few seconds. While she thought, the Adamantine Man stood in the middle of the cell with Rat over his back. He didn’t do anything; he just stood there, waiting. ‘We’ll have to find someone who does, then,’ she snapped at him. Think. Think! The Pinnacles were surrounded by dragons. Back in the days of the speakers, when Queen Zafir had lived here, people had landed them on the tops of the peaks, but there were other ways in. There were passages and tunnels down to the ruin of the Silver City — Kataros knew that because that was how they’d brought her here in the first place.

She’d have to find someone else, someone who knew the ways. She’d have to make another blood-bond. Some of the alchemists under the Purple Spur had quietly been getting a lot of practice at that. There, like here, you survived as best you could. Every day you ate, someone else didn’t. But not her. If she bound someone else, she might have to let this one go. There’d be consequences to that.

The Adamantine Man sniffed. ‘Actually, I do know a way,’ he said. ‘As long as it’s dark. Up and out the side.’

‘Up?’

‘Yes.’

‘You want me to climb down the side of the mountain? They’re sheer cliffs out there! And how are you going to carry him?’

He was shaking his head. ‘No climbing. It’s easier than that.’ He frowned. ‘It’s like flying, I suppose. But not on the back of a dragon.’

She reached through the blood-bond, looking for the trick, for the deception, for the twisting of her demand, but there was nothing. He believed what he was saying.

‘It’s supposed to be a way down to the Silver City.’

‘ Supposed to be? You mean you don’t know?’

He shrugged. ‘I know what I’ve heard, and what I’ve heard is there’s a way. You fly like a bird. I’ve not done it, but I’ve heard how.’

She looked a second time. He still meant every word.

‘Once you leave, you can’t come back. So they don’t guard it,’ he said.

‘Show me.’ Like a bird? Was that possible? How did a man grow wings?

‘Do you know what it’s like in the Silver City?’

‘No.’ She shook her head and she didn’t care. They’d go where they had to, and that was that.

‘You’re an alchemist. Do you know how to make a potion so a dragon doesn’t know where you are?’

‘Yes. What of it?’

‘Got any on you?’

She looked down at herself. A robe, torn and dirty, and that was it. ‘Don’t be stupid.’

‘Well, since there’s dragons down there, we’ll most likely die then.’

Eight months before the Black Mausoleum

After the darkness, the brilliance of the flames pouring from the mouth of the canal was blinding. Skjorl couldn’t look. Couldn’t think. Was just thankful he could see again, could see where his feet were landing. Could run. That was all that mattered. Getting away. Everything else came later, if it came at all, with the dazed knowing that you were still alive.