Barb Hendee - Through Stone and Sea

The first time she'd seen these two was in the doorway of High-Tower's office. Did they share a bond beyond their calling, something deeper, fouler than with the others of their caste? No doubt Cinder-Shard knew what had brought Ore-Locks to "service," so was the master Stonewalker as corrupt as the outcast of the Iron-Braids?

"He is my mentor," Ore-Locks said. "He has taught me from my earliest days."

Wynn said nothing to this. Cinder-Shard didn't glance back, though he must have heard.

Ore-Locks's declaration only heightened Wynn's suspicion of his mentor. She'd become blindly entangled in unfolding events and couldn't abandon her path. In that moment, she almost wished she hadn't taken on this shadowy purpose—to halt the wraith, to learn the texts' secrets, to know for certain if the fears of Most Aged Father and others were true.

Was the Ancient Enemy returning soon? It appeared that its servants were already on the move. Cinder-Shard halted and turned to face her.

"We enter a place kept safe," he declared in warning. "You will swear never to speak of what you see … nor scribble about it."

Steel streaks in his black hair glinted like fire strands by the light of the walls' orange crystals.

Wynn flushed with fresh anger and swallowed hard. She was sick of this, always shackled by truth itself against the integrity she'd once thought the guild stood for.

"Agreed," she finally answered.

"Swear it … by your honor to the sages!"

His demand went against the very thing he expected her to swear by.

Truth through Knowledge … Knowledge through Understanding … Understanding through Truth … Wisdom's Eternal Cycle.

But how many times since she'd returned had she lied, manipulated, held what she knew like a tool, a weapon, or a chain upon others? Oh, she could always claim a reason to uncover what others refused to acknowledge and to save them from themselves. But even that seemed a hollow excuse sometimes.

Was she even a sage in anything more than title?

Yet there were still a few who'd put their faith in her, from Domin il'Sänke and perhaps Tärpodious, to young Nikolas Columsarn and others. Even High-Tower in his bitter way.

"I swear by the creed of my guild," she answered.

Cinder-Shard led the way into a new cavern. Wynn breathed in, held it as she followed—and then exhaled and scowled.

It was just another cavern. No orange crystals lit the space. By only the far wall's glimmer, she walked a wide, cleared path between calcified, shadowy columns. Here and there, thickened protrusions rose between those. Then she caught a looming shape in the corner of her sight.

Wynn sidestepped in reflex, glancing as she walked on.

A hulking stalagmite rose from the cavern floor, thick and fat all the way up to head-high. Its top joined the narrower end of a descending stalactite, but that faintly glistening bulk was too big to have formed from just drizzling, mineral-laden water. Some boulder or outcrop had once stood there, now buried beneath decades of buildup.

Cinder-Shard veered off the path, directly into the forest of columns.

Wynn stepped carefully, for the floor was rough and the way narrow and erratic at times. Ore-Locks fell back behind her. As Cinder-Shard made a sudden turn around a thickened protrusion, Wynn's boot toe caught on something in the dark.

As she toppled sidelong, her shoulder struck another broad outcrop. When she recoiled, finally regaining her footing, she squinted at the dark shape. For an instant, it looked too much like a rough mockery of a Lhärgnæ's false tomb.

Wynn's jaw locked, and the closer she looked, the more every muscle tensed. There was a resemblance.

At the top of the wide protrusion, it narrowed over rounded "shoulders" to the bulk of a "head" melding into the tip of a descending stalactite. Wynn shoved her hand into her pocket, digging for her crystal.

"No!" Ore-Locks said—and his thick fingers closed on her wrist.

Wynn spun toward him and lurched back, bumping straight into the calcified dark form.

"Get your hand off me!"

Ore-Locks's grip remained, and she hadn't managed to grasp her cold lamp crystal. Cinder-Shard loomed into sight beside her.

"Do not bring light in here!"

Wynn barely made out his scowl in the dark. Ore-Locks slowly released his grip and held up both open hands.

"Do not disturb their rest," he added.

Wynn glanced frantically between them and then into the dark forest of glistening columns. She spotted at least six more protrusions nearby but couldn't see farther, not even back to the path they'd left. Her gaze fell on one hulk half-hidden beyond a stalagmite's upward spike.

Pale phosphorescence illuminated its features.

The female's eyes were perhaps open, though there was no way to be certain. Even her clothing was nothing more than ripples of calcification. She gripped something in her hands, long, narrow, and slightly slanted. Beneath clumped mineral deposits coating its whole length, it could have been a thick staff. The buildup had turned her hands into lumps where they held it.

Wynn saw other dark shapes about the cavern's silent stillness. Comprehension lessened her tension but didn't bring ease.

She was standing among the dead.

Was this what it meant to be taken into stone ? No coffins or even tombs, the Hassäg'kreigi entombed their honored dead in stone itself. Left here for years, decades, perhaps more, they would become one with the earth and stone their people cherished. But the number of them was disturbing at a guess.

In the rush when she was locked away in the Chamber of the Fallen, she'd passed too quickly through at least two other such places. Wynn turned all the way around, a wild notion rising in her thoughts.

"Is Feather-Tongue here?" she breathed, about to backtrack and search.

Ore-Locks blocked her way.

"Bedzâ'kenge is in his temple," he answered. "As are all Bäynæ who live on among us."

Wynn's eyes narrowed. That was impossible, though she now knew she wouldn't find Feather-Tongue's remains here, Dhredze was the only known seatt still in existence, but likely not as old as the mythical war. By the tales of Feather-Tongue's life, he'd lived at a time when there were others, perhaps back beyond the war and into the Forgotten History. This left her wondering about the great statues of the Bäynæ in their temples.

Did those statues truly hold the bones of the Thänæ who'd become the dwarves' Eternals? Or was Ore-Locks's claim just a spiritual metaphor?

Wynn looked once more among the honored dead slowly turning to stone through the ages. She wished she hadn't sworn to keep all of this to herself.

Cinder-Shard pulled her onward, and then stopped before the cavern's back wall. It was so dark that she couldn't be certain, but there didn't appear to be any door or opening. Was it hidden, like the one the duchess had used to come here?

Cinder-Shard turned to her. "You have audacity. Do you also have courage?"

She didn't know what he meant, but she answered, "Yes."

Cinder-Shard held out his hand. "Take it."

Wynn did so with slight hesitation—then panicked as she realized what would happen. She had seen Cinder-Shard force the wraith into the wall, perhaps trying to entomb it in stone. He knew what had called to Ore-Locks and had still taken the man in. And she had blindly gone alone with both of them.

It would be so easy to be rid of her. No one would ever know what became of her.

Cinder-Shard's face sank into the damp wall.

Wynn stopped breathing as the texture of glittering rock spread down his hair and across his back. She tried to jerk free but was dragged toward the wall. A sharp voice rose behind her.

"Do not breathe!" Ore-Locks warned. "Not until you hear him speak to you!"