The Other Side

Skia of Galimar is almost to her objective when she hears the approach of a troop of guards. Her heart races with trepidation. This is her only chance to find the source of the Agrimak’s new power before her people are destroyed. If she is captured, her life and her people are forfeit. Desperately she tries a nearby door but finds it locked. The clatter of the guards is getting louder. Her time is almost up.  

With a forced calm, she pulls out her lock picks and sets to the task with a will. Her clammy and unsteady hands make the simple task take longer than it should, but the lock clicks open. She slips into the room and quietly closes the door behind her. Her heart pounds as she tries to quiet her breathing, listening for signs she was seen. The noise of the guards is muffled by the stout door and stone walls, but it seems she has eluded capture again. Now she must wait for the guards to leave before she can continue to the lord’s chambers and search for her answers. 

As Skia’s heart slows to a normal rhythm, she waits for her opportunity, but still, the guards remain. By the sound of it, they have taken up a post right outside the door. Trapped, she closes her eyes and prays for guidance. After taking a slow, deep breath, she considers her surroundings.  

The full moon through the window illuminates the room, which seems to be nothing more than storage for unwanted furniture. Dressers and tables are stacked haphazardly against the walls, with carpets rolled and stowed in corners. Old frames, candle holders, basins, and all sorts of household clutter fill the odd spaces. A large fireplace escaped the onslaught of household debris and remains unblocked.

Curious about this exception to the chaos, Skia decides to explore until the guards move on. She wanders over to the fireplace and peeks in. With no wood or soot in evidence, the fireplace must not have been used for a long time. Since this room is obviously not habitable that is not surprising. However, there is no dust in the fireplace. Dust lays thick upon the piled oddments in the room, but the open floor and the fireplace are remarkably clear of dust.  

Skia ducks into the dark fireplace and finds it just tall enough to stand. Using her hands more than her eyes in the dark recesses, she finds a gap in the back corner. She halts with bated breath and fumbles out a light-stone, being careful to keep her body between it and the door, just in case. The sidewall of the fireplace does not quite meet the back wall, leaving the small gap she felt. With the faint light of the stone, she nearly overlooks the odd brick at the base of the wall. It is slightly raised from all the rest. She kneels down and tests for resistance. After a firm push, it sinks into the floor until she hears a faint click and the sidewall of the fireplace swings inward on silent hinges. Cool air escapes from the dark passage beyond.

Tingles chase themselves up and down her spine and dance on her scalp. The gods heard her prayers and this is their answer. This is where she needs to be. If she had gotten to the lord’s chambers, she might not have discovered this passage, certainly not in time. Her heart pounds with excitement as she steps through the opening.

The passageway is narrow, and she makes each step with care as the floor is uneven and slippery in places. She navigates the downward-sloping path by the dim but steady light of her stone. Soon she reaches a branch and must make a choice. She looks left to a featureless path and right to another featureless path.  

With nothing to indicate which way is correct, she takes the right-hand path and makes her way forward. The path turns frequently, disorienting her. After one such turn, the floor becomes a smooth wooden span that creaks slightly as she puts one foot on it. The hair on the back of her neck rises and her stomach clenches; something is wrong. Taking a deep breath, she can smell the tang of rust in the air. She peers ahead through the gloom. The wooden span ends just before what looks like another switch in the path, but she begins to suspect its a dead end, literally. Carefully, she stomps on the wood, feels it sink just a bit and hears a metallic grating underneath. She licks her lips and tries to think through her dilemma.  

Skia can’t afford to make a mistake. Weighing her options, she decides to use another light-stone to illuminate the passage on the other side of the wood. Setting her current light-stone down a few steps back, she pulls out another and tosses it down the path. As it arcs through the air, she thinks she sees a gossamer-thin strand stretching between the walls. The stone hits the far wall and rolls across the dusty floor. No path on either side is revealed, only the dust of disuse. She groans with frustration and picks up her first stone. Though she is grateful to have avoided the pitfall, the delay of the false path hastens Skia’s steps. She tries to maintain caution but her time is limited. She reaches the branch where she misjudged and keeps going. 

The path is descending steadily now and switching directions at odd intervals. At one turn, she nearly slips into a deep pit that stretches across the entire path. She gasps and back peddles desperately, her light-stone flies out of her hand and she lands on her back with a thud. Her heart pounds with anxiety as she realizes both how close she came to disaster and that she overlooked something somewhere.  

No time to wallow, she slides back from the pit and gets to her feet, heart thumping and breath shaking. She quickly looks around for her light-stone, which has landed back by the previous turn. She steadies herself against the wall as she approaches the light-stone. As she reaches for it, she notices it’s resting against a raised stone of the floor. She gasps and her mouth drops open in surprise. She picks up her stone, then takes a deep breath and holds it as she steps hopefully on the stone. It sinks down with a satisfying clink of a releasing mechanism. A false wall swings open to reveal a steep set of narrow stairs. Moist, stone scented air flows up from the depths.

With a quick prayer of gratitude, she descends into the darkness below. The scent of wet stone is pervasive but a new scent is growing as she approaches the bottom, a bitter scent combined with the metallic tang of blood.

With sweat beading on her face and neck, she reaches the end of the stairs on aching legs. A thick, iron-bound door fitted with a well-made lock looms before her. With time against her, she takes a deep breath and once again pulls out her lock picks. Her hands are not as steady as they should be and sweat makes her grasp less firm. After the near-misses and trek down the stairs, the unsettling odor is making her increasingly anxious and queasy.

As the door unlocks, she feels a pop as a spell releases and the door opens. She panics and scrambles in and quickly surveys the room. Straight ahead, in the light of flickering torches, she sees a huge cage with something dark inside. To her right, and of far more immediate importance, a man in dark robes rouses from slumber on a cot. She pulls out a knife and throws it straight at the man’s heart. The man deflects the knife with a casual wave of his hand. Her heart skips a beat, and she sprints towards him, readying another knife. 

Skia can feel magic building in the air as the man waves his hands and chants. She dodges and rolls as he releases his spell. When the power hits it only makes her stumble instead of knocking her off her feet. Quick and nimble as she can, she reaches the mage and thrusts her knife at him. With the folds of his cloak confounding her aim, she struggles to find her target. The mage tries to grapple with her, but he is obviously inexperienced in such things, and his robe puts up a better defense than he does. But even that protection doesn’t last long.  

Skia finally drives the point of her dagger home; its spells conquer his. The man falls dead at her feet. The bitter smell of spent magic fills the air as she catches her breath and tries to slow her pounding heart. As her breathing eases slightly she realizes there is a new sound in the room. A low and ferocious growl rumbles through the air.

Slowly Skia turns to look at the cage. Inside she sees two fiery eyes, staring at her. Careful not to challenge the beast, she lowers her head and averts her eyes. She finally sees the rest of the room. On the opposite side of the room from where she stands, a series of shelves and tables were set with a massive array of bottles, jars, and chests, as well as many types of blades. The smell of blood, both stale and fresh, mixed with the bitterness of magic made blood magic obvious.

Skia narrows her eyes. This sort of magic was vile, feeding off the misery and life force of others. She knows from all her studies that even the corpse of the man that worked with such magics could prove dangerous. Luckily, fire fixes many things, breaking bonds that should not exist. She takes a deep breath to settle her nerves, grimacing at the acrid smell. The growl of the beast fills the chamber.

“All right now, beasty. I’ll get this all sorted out. You just stay calm for a bit and we’ll see the end of this mess.” To her complete shock, the beast stops growling. Glancing over at it, Skia sees it sitting on its haunches with its head canted. It has the head of a massive wolf, with shattered remains of horns crowing its skull. As she watches, it lays down and blinks slowly at her. She blinks back in surprise. “Well, I guess that’s that. Thanks for the confidence.”

With a nod to the patient beast, Skia turns back to her task. She searches the mage for a key to the cage but finds nothing. Dragging the man over to the shelves and tables is challenging but not as bad as it could be since the man was slight and not well muscled. She is breathing heavy as she makes an impromptu pyre over the body, using the tables, shelves, and contents as fuel. Sweat drips into her eyes and down her back as she works. The smell of blood magic is overwhelming now, and her stomach heaves.

Once her pile is finished, she steps back to search in her pouch of supplies. She pulls out a vial of oil and throws it onto the pile, where it shatters and adds a pungent, oily smell to the air. Next, she throws on a handful of sulfur smelling powder. She moves to the middle of the room, breaks an orange and red baton and throws it on her creation. A fire roars into existence, making Skia’s face tighten in the sudden heat.

The raging fire fully illuminates the room, revealing the beast in all its battered glory. Approximately the size of a large bear, the beast is black and vaguely wolf shaped, though far more muscular even in its starved and ravaged state. Its ruff is fashioned of quills that glisten in the light of the raging fire. At its sides are massive, bat-like wings, deformed and cropped by its cruel tormentor. As she watches, it stands and shakes, making its quills rattle and flash. It’s short tail twitches behind it, far too short for a beast of its stature.  

The beast makes a soft noise and thrusts its nose to the cot. Skia hastens to follow the obvious suggestion and searches the area. In a drawer of a small table on the far side of the cot, she finds a large key that stings her hand with cold. She gasps in shock and drops it on the stone floor with a ringing clatter. Her heart pounds and she takes a steadying breath.  She pulls out her gloves and puts them on to retrieve the key. The cold is muted now, but she still feels an ache through the material of the gloves and it spurs her movements as she approaches the massive cage. No matter what happens now, her mission is complete. The source of the Agrimak’s power is gone. Galimar will once again stand a chance against their ancient enemies.

Skia unlocks the door and releases the beast. With what grace it can muster in its battered state, the beast strides out of the cage with purpose and approaches the nearby corner of the room. In the dancing shadows, the beast's movements are obscured, but a large slab of stone falls with a bang and cloud of dust, creating a ramp leading to another passage. The beast looks back at her, its black tongue lolling out of its mouth of deadly teeth as its battered and cropped tail swishes back and forth.  

When the beast pads out, she follows in its wake, breathless in wonder.