Mark of the Fool 5: A Progression Fantasy Epic, page 39
“Do you know anything about these tunnels?” the Sage asked.
“Uh, anything specific?” Paul cut off another whispered retort he was about to give Peter.
“Did your commanders say whether or not these caves were natural?”
“There was a bit of talk about that,” Peter said. “Most think the Traveller herself carved them with her power, but others think the wall texture might’ve been from the dungeon that formed here.” He made the sign of Uldar over his chest. “Thank the Traveller she destroyed the monsters, even in death. If a horde of silence-spiders attacked Alric—”
“—there’d be no more Alric,” Paul finished. “Lots of people who were fleeing to the ships would’ve been killed too.”
He paused, and Drestra could feel him struggling with something he wanted to say.
“Er, you said you had dealings with the Generasians?” Paul asked. “Did you spend a lot of time down there?”
The Sage frowned, her attention shifting to the two guards, sharpening to a razor’s edge. Slowly, she turned to face them, reptilian eyes narrowing. Tension grew. Both guards seemed to notice; their movements tensed as they met her gaze.
‘Are they diffing for information?’ she wondered. ‘How much do they know? Are they part of a bigger plot?’
Her mana flared.
‘Are they supposed to be pretending to guide me, but are really here to silence me?’
Drestra counted the steps between her and them, calculating whether she could get a spell off before they lowered their spears. If magic failed…
Her eyes measured the ceiling height.
Too low.
No way for her to—
“Well, it’s probably a long shot, but…” Paul cleared his throat. “But since you’ve met with folk from that big, fancy place… I was wondering if you happened to come across a young Thameish lad by the name of Alex Roth?” He sucked in his gut. “Tall, gangly fella. Likes bad jokes and thinks himself clever.”
Drestra stared at the pair, confused.
“Or a young woman named Theresa Lu,” Peter added. “Dark hair, ferocious look on her face most of the time, like a bear that’s been stung by a nest of bees.”
“Has herself this big, scary, three-headed dog,” Paul jumped back in. “Friendly to most, but he’s a bear-killer. About the size of a pony.”
The Sage continued to stare at them, her jaw dropping behind her veil.
“Oh! Oh! And they’d have a little girl with them.” Peter raised a hand like he was trying to catch the teacher’s attention in church school. “No older than ten… no wait, maybe she’d be twelve by now? By Uldar, has it already been more than a year? In any case, have you met any of them? I figure at least the dog would leave an impression. They’re from our town and—”
“Wait, you’re from Alric?”
“Born and bred, the both of us,” Peter said with pride. “Anyway, that bunch was going—”
Drestra suddenly burst into laughter so hard, both guards jumped a foot.
It had the sound of dry twigs snapping.
‘Oh, for the sake of reason, Drestra! Come on, really? A plot? These two?’ She remembered how they’d reacted in the priest’s office when the Generasians were mentioned. ‘You must be losing your mind. You can’t start jumping at shadows!’
The Sage kept laughing at herself—almost delirious with relief—she doubled over with one hand on a knee, and the other holding her fluttering veil in place.
The two guards were looking at each other in the way folk often do when confronted with a strange and unpredictable creature. They took a few steps back.
“Uh,” Paul cleared his throat. “You uh… you alright there, Holy Sage?”
“I’m fine, forgive me,” she apologised after a few more moments of uncontrollable laughter before she could finally straighten up and wipe tears away. “Apologies, I might’ve caused a cave-in, laughing like that!”
“Oh, this tunnel’s stable, Holy Sage,” Peter said. “It’s just… you know… infested with beast-goblins. A lot of beast-goblins. And maybe a lot of other monsters.”
“And I might’ve attracted them all?” Drestra asked, suddenly feeling light. Giddy, even. To think she’d been frightened at something so simple! “I must apologise again. I should’ve kept more control over myself.”
“Oh, uh, well… I guess we all need a good laugh sometimes?” Paul offered, in the sort of gentle tone one might use if they were questioning another’s sanity.
“Yeah, I mean… maybe we just said something that would be a funny joke to someone from Crymlyn Swamp,” Peter suggested. “There’s no accounting for the humour of strangers. Er! Not to say, you’re a stranger, Holy Sage, or anything—”
“It’s alright, it’s alright.” Drestra waved her hand, turning back toward the dark tunnel ahead. “And could you hold that thought for a moment?”
“Oh, sure.” Paul elbowed Peter in his ribs, shooting him a hard glare. There was a slight clink of armour against armour. “Did we offend?”
“No, I just need to concentrate,” Drestra said lightly, preparing to chant a spell. “We’re about to be attacked, after all.”
“Wait, what?” both guards asked as one.
Screams were their answer. From around the corner ahead, a horde of beast-goblins tore past a jutting wall shrieking and howling like the Ravener itself was behind them. They charged straight for the Sage and guards, eyes wild, and fangs bared, starved for blood and flesh.
They were instead offered their fill of lightning and flame, and the relieved laughter of a half-delirious Hero.
“You hear someone laughing?” a guard accompanying the Chosen whispered. “Sounded like a ghost.”
“Maybe it’s the Traveller’s spirit or some other lost soul trapped down here,” the other whispered back. “Oh Uldar, guard our spirits.”
Ahead of them, Cedric fought to keep a straight face, realising that there were smaller tunnels connecting the passageways, since the delirious laughter coming from the right, was being made by Drestra’s crackling voice.
‘Be bloody-well more believable if it were a ghost,’ he thought, gripping the haft of his morphic weapon. ‘Didn’t think she could even laugh, never mind like that…’
His brow creased.
‘Matter of fact, ain’t it more believable that it’s a bloody ghost? Mimickin’ her bloody voice?’ he thought.
His expression was grim as he offered a silent prayer to Uldar and felt the holy energy spreading over his weapon, sheathing it in divine power as he watched.
‘Callin’ on him don’t feel natural like it used to.’ The Chosen’s spirits were low. ‘At least he’s still lendin’ me his power, even if he’s up t’somethin’.’
Cedric raised his spear and walked cautiously into the dark, poised to strike ghosts or anything else lurking there with his and Uldar’s power.
Hart paused, listening to laughter echoing in the distance. Behind him, the two guards drew their swords and slammed down their visors.
‘Huh,’ the Champion thought. ‘Drestra’s finally gone mad. Well, it was just a matter of time, I guess.’
Shrugging, he continued leading his escort into the darkness.
The Sage dusted off her hands while stepping over piles of beast-goblin and agarici bodies. The latter were colossal, lumbering, humanoid-like fungi with shocking power behind their blows—blows that felt like they came from a sledgehammer but were still no match for Drestra’s own power.
“Well, would you look at that.” Peter lifted his visor, gaping in amazement. “Almost feel sorry for those bloody Ravener-spawn that have to face you.”
“I wouldn’t go that far.” Paul poked one of the smoking mushrooms. “I’m just glad I was behind all that magicy stuff, and not in front of it.”
“It looks like the beast-goblins were feeding on the agarici,” the Sage noted, stepping past the last corpse. A glance at one of the mushroom-creature’s sucker-shaped ‘mouths’ revealed a scrap of something green clinging to it. “Or maybe it was the other way around.”
“Well, now worms will be feeding on all of them, if we leave them here,” Paul said. “When we get back, we’ll put in a request to have them taken away. The air could turn nasty if we leave them rotting down here.”
“They already stink. Can’t imagine how bad it’ll be if we just left ’em.” Peter’s nostrils flared.
“Let’s move on,” Drestra said, ready for what monsters or whatever else they might uncover.
“Right you are, Holy Sage,” Peter said, following her down the tunnel, his lantern held high, candlelight dappling the walls.
Irritation flared. That ‘Holy Sage’ business had been irritating even before she’d learned that this whole thing could be built on a foundation of secrets and lies.
Now, it made her want to heave.
“Drestra,” she corrected the guard.
“Mm?”
“No need for all that ‘Holy Sage’ business,” she said. “Just call me Drestra.”
The two guards looked taken aback.
“Alright, Hol—Er, Drestra,” Peter said. “After what you just did to those monsters, I’d call you ‘queen’ if that wasn’t probably treason. Is that treason, Paul?”
“How should I know?” Paul sounded mildly annoyed. “Anyway, no one’s going to be around to hear you creep out Drestra when you call her queen, so go right ahead. Call the powerful mage weird names, mate. Just let me step back into the tunnel about a hundred paces or so.”
Drestra gave another crackling chuckle as they walked along. “Oh, that reminds me, I did meet a Theresa Lu with the Generasians and, indeed, I met her boyfriend, Alex Roth, and her big dog Brutus! I haven’t met the little sister, though.”
“Well, that’s—Wait, boyfriend? Hah!” Paul chuckled. “Well, it finally happened, did it?”
“What finally happened?” Peter asked.
“Oi, what good is a guard who has less eyes than sense.” Paul glared at him. “Those two’ve been making goo-goo eyes at each other for years.”
“Well, Paul, unlike you, I don’t go paying attention to every teenager in town making goo-goo eyes at each other! Now who’s the bloody creep? Maybe I should be stepping a hundred yards away from you. Anyway.” He smiled warmly. “Good for those two. Glad something positive came out of all that mess. Theresa’s mum and dad told us that the four of them went ahead so Alex could reach that fancy magic university. Hah, nice to hear he’s having a good time. He deserves it since he got such a bloody rough birthday gift.”
“Hm?” Drestra cocked her head. “Birthday gift?”
“Yeah,” Paul grunted. “The boy has the worst luck. First there was what happened to his mum and dad. And then the Ravener comes back on his eighteenth birthday, right as he gets his inheritance. Got fired too, but I think that might’ve been his own doing!”
“Oh?” Drestra frowned. “Fired from wha—”
Her mind ground to a halt.
“Wait… When did you say his birthday was?”
Chapter 51
Links in the Chain of Destiny
“It was the same time the Ravener came back,” Paul said, shaking his head. “Turned eighteen that very day and then—that evening—we heard that the Heroes were marked, and a new Ravener cycle was starting.”
“Alex’s eighteenth birthday was the same day the Ravener came back… the day the Heroes got marked?” Drestra’s brows rose.
“Oh yeah,” Peter said. “Was a nasty coincidence, that. Glad he got out when he did. I don’t know if ya know this, but he and his sister have had enough bad in their young lives with what happened to their folks in that fire, and all. The poor lad had been working himself to the bone for a nice future and then bam, the day he’s grown to the law, is the day all hell breaks out in Thameland. So, it’s good he’s finally catching a break and now things are going his way for a change. How’d you meet them?”
Silence followed.
“Everything alright?” Paul asked. “Are more monsters coming down the tunnel?”
“Hm?” Drestra shook her head. “No, I was just thinking. Anyway, I can confirm that he’s doing well. He’s studying at the university in Generasi. He’s gotten… powerful with magic.” Her mind crawled over the times she’d seen him cast spells. “He even made a golem.”
“Oh,” Paul said. “That’s nice, I suppose. Er, what’s a golem, Peter?”
“How should I know?” Peter hissed. “Well, good to hear he’s getting all fancy. Maybe he’ll come back to Alric, set up some kind of wizard’s tower and help folks in town with his magic.”
“Oh, come on, Peter,” Paul said with disdain. “You know half the young folk who learn a bloody trade don’t come back to Alric. Do you really think a fancy wizard’s going to come back? That’d be fooli—” He paused, then suddenly broke into laughter. “You know what’s funny, Drestra?”
The Sage’s mind continued turning over memories of when she’d first met Alex, Theresa, and their friends. In truth, she liked Theresa the most of their group—they had a lot in common—but Alex was the one who got her to open up about things she’d buried for months.
Her frustrations.
Worries.
All of her desires, when it came to ending the war once and for all.
All had come pouring out like someone had punched a hole in a full rain barrel. It was like he’d known exactly what to say to her.
‘After we met the Generasians,’ she thought. ‘The stress of everything seemed a little easier to bear. I got along better with Hart and Cedric. We even started working more like a team. It’s not perfect, but we’re not working against each other either. And, when Alex was around giving strategy suggestions, we really fought well together. It’s true that he and his friends were trained by Baelin, but… it was almost like a missing piece was slotted into place.’
“Drestra, you alright?” Paul asked.
“Hm, yes!” The Sage pulled her mind back to the present. “What… what was so funny?”
“Heh, well, you know.” The guard from Alric chuckled. “Maybe you had to be there, but I remember telling that boy: ‘Act the fool long enough and you’ll get the fool’s mark,’ and I was pointing right at that ugly face on the Fool statue in the fountain in town. Could you imagine if that had happened?”
He snorted. “About to go to wizard university and then he loses his chance because the Fool can’t do magic? It’d be a tragedy. Shit, I would’ve felt terrible. You know, maybe that’s not as funny as I thought it was.”
“Nice going, Peter,” the other guard muttered. “Now, quit flappin’ your jaws. Look.”
He pointed to a symbol carved in the stone wall ahead, lightly illuminated by Drestra’s forceball. “There’s the marker from the first survey team. We’re down as deep as they made it before the monsters got too thick to fight through.”
The guard clapped down his visor. “From here on, we’ve got no idea what we’ll find. Best be on our toes.”
“Yeah,” Paul agreed. “Don’t wanna end up dead down here in the dark like those monsters.”
“Don’t worry,” Drestra said. “I’ll protect you.”
Alex and Theresa had shown how far they’d go to help her people, even risking their own lives, so she wasn’t about to let anything happen to folk from their hometown. She had a duty to them.
And so, the trio went quiet with the Sage fixed on their surroundings.
She needed her focus, but try as she might, her thoughts drifted back to Alex Roth. All of Cedric’s musings about something being off with him came back to her.
‘Cedric kept saying how he found it odd that the chitterer dungeon seemed to focus on Alex, didn’t he? I remember some talk about that. But him being the Fool doesn’t make sense, does it? He can cast magic. He built a golem. I’ve seen him fight—’
She hesitated.
Had she seen him fight…?
She remembered their first battle together, the one above the two dungeons in Greymoor. Their fight with the cultists and demons patrolling Crymlyn Swamp when they’d grabbed Llyworn and Rhodri to question them. And the tail-end of the fight against that greater demon Zonon-In in the Skull Pits.
Her mind sifted through details of each confrontation, carefully.
She startled at a revelation.
‘Did… has he ever cast a combat spell that you saw?’ She brought to mind every memory of him spellcasting that she had. ‘Yeah, he did. He used those potions to make things fly around and rip themselves apart. But—that’s not really a combat spell, is it?’
The more she thought, the more she realised she’d never actually seen him cast force missile, or any fire or lightning spells, or any direct combat spells, for that matter. In three battles—all deadly—he hadn’t cast a single combat spell once?
Why not?
‘As a matter of fact…’ She thought back to the times she’d seen him. ‘I don’t remember him ever carrying a weapon. His whole cabal, all his friends, carry weapons. Even Isolde has her dagger. He looks like a fighter, he’s all muscle, he’s got all that strength, and he’s fast too. Yet he doesn’t even have a short sword to defend himself with?’
It made no sense. His entire group carried weapons, some more than one, or they used battle magic. How come he only carried potions, ropes, and tools?
‘And has he ever hurt anything directly, anything that I’ve seen. I don’t think I’ve even seen him wound something—wait. Those potions, they rip things apart. That’s definitely using a weapon. And the Fool can’t fight… or hurt living things. Or use magic, for that matter!’
She shook her head, trying to stop the stream of contradictory thoughts running through her mind.
There were some odd, suspicious things going on with Alex—like him seeming to appear before everyone else whenever they were teleported—but it was a historical fact that the Fool couldn’t use spellcraft, divinity, or fight.
