“Damn it, Ihra, why didn’t you call for us?” He cast Circle of Forgiveness as he spoke, relaxing as the lingering wounds upon her shoulder began to heal up. “What happened?”

  “Ran into an old friend,” she responded tersely.

  “What does that mean? More undead?”

  “Yes, though this one was different - this one was Ame?l-Belet.”

  Though the name seemed familiar, it took Jasper a second to place it. “Wait - you mean the guy from the council, the one who wanted to run.” He grimaced as she nodded. “Well that sucks. Guess the sick guy was right - they were all doomed.”

  “Just because he died doesn’t mean the others did,” Ihra pointed out, though she matched his grim expression. “Of course, it’s also possible there’s now a horde of undead waiting for us in the tunnel.”

  S?ams?a?dur cleared his throat. “As much as I’d love to spend more time imagining the horrors we might face,” he said, his voice dripping with sarcasm, “Might I remind you of the horrors that are definitely coming after us? If I’m not mistaken, they’ve reached the acropolis already.”

  “Crap. You sure you’re alright,” he asked Ihra, who shrugged.

  “Shoulder’s still a little sore but everything’s in working order.”

  “Then we should keep moving.”

  Ihra took point again as they moved into the darkness. Moving at a clip just below jogging, it didn’t take long to reach the hall of the dead. In a different situation, Jasper would have loved to explore the hall. The rows of elevated sarcophagi, watched over by the silent statue of Yarkah, cloaked in the eerie blue light of the enchanted orbs bore a marked resemblance to the Seraph’s tomb. Perhaps the similarities were mere coincidence, but he wondered if this place also offered a class or legacy to those that knew how to initiate the trials. Unfortunately, though, they had no time to waste on exploration.

  They rushed through the hall without stopping, and plunged back into the dark tunnels. This was as far as Ihra and Nissila?t had scouted, so their progress slowed as the group kept a wary eye out for traps.

  Their caution swiftly proved merited. While they hadn’t encountered any traps in the upper tunnels, they’d only gone a short distance beyond the halls of the dead before they reached a locked gate. Since it was barred from their side, the lock was no issue, but they nearly missed the thin tripwire spread across the entrance - a wire so thin that even after Ihra pointed it out, Jasper didn’t have a high enough perception stat to see it.

  That was only the start of the traps. Though they were only a few hundred feet from the point where the narrow passage exited into the underground road leading to the fortress, their progress slowed to a crawl as they realized the entire distance was riddled with mines, along with the occasional tripwire connected to more exotic traps. Without Ihra and Nissila?t’s help, Jasper doubted they could have made it through the passage at all, but even with their aid, their slow progress down the tunnel was an exercise in torture only exacerbated by the knowledge of the enemies behind them.

  Rivers of sweat flooded down Jasper's back by the time they reached the tunnel’s exit. “Careful,” Ihra warned as she guided his foot up and above another visible tripwire strung waist high across the passage, and steadied him as he pivoted his hip and brought the other leg over gingerly. “Am I clear?”

  She gave him a thumbs up and motioned for them to wait, as she crouched down and examined the road in front of them. Unlike the narrow tunnel that led from the Ekalla?li to the hall of the dead, the passage they’d exited onto was a wide, finely paved avenue. It was dimly lit by distantly spaced orbs mounted on the walls, and Jasper could see dozens of dark tunnel entrances branching off in both directions. He turned to his left, the direction the ritual site was supposed to be in, but it wasn’t close enough to see.

  “I think we’re good,” Ihra said, wiping her hands clean as she stood up. “You catch anything, Nissila?t?”

  “If there’s any traps here, they’re too sophisticated for my eye to see.”

  “Is that something we should be worried about,” Jasper asked, not liking the idea of wandering blindly into traps. He hadn’t even been able to see the tripwires, so it wasn’t a stretch to think there could be something that would evade their vision, but the woman just snorted.

  “No, I don’t think we need to worry. Whoever did the traps in the tunnel was a rank amateur, probably that poor fool we fought.”

  A rank amateur? How bad is my vision? He caught Ihra’s eye questioningly, and she shrugged. “Nissila?t’s the expert here; if she isn’t worried, then I think we’re safe.”

  “Then let’s make up for lost time,” Jasper said. He was a little tense as he sprinted to the left, hoping that Nissila?t’s confidence was well earned, but when he made it fifty feet down the passage without going up in a resounding boom, he relaxed. The rest caught up with him quickly, sprinting ahead as distance grew between the warriors and the mages.

  Find this and other great novels on the author's preferred platform. Support original creators!

  The route to the ritual site had looked like a short jog to the left on the map Ihra had found, but they had underestimated the sheer size of the underground complex. If Jasper had to guess, it was probably three miles before their objective came into view, though it didn’t take them too long to reach it. While he might not have had the stats to compete with Ihra and Nissila?t, he could still blow any Olympian away, and he crossed the three miles in well under ten minutes. Still the others were already there waiting for him, clustered around a massive hole in the ground.

  “Is this the place?” He paused beside Ihra, panting slightly as he glanced down at the yawning chasm cut into the earth - though one made by man, not nature. "Wow, what the hell is that?”

  A massive, inverted pyramid had been hewn into the bedrock. Its terraced sides and intricate mason-work reminded Jasper of an Indian stepwell, but unlike those reservoirs, easy access was clearly not on the builders’ minds. Instead of a series zig-zagging steps offering a path down to the waters that anyone could follow, the inverted pyramid below them had a single narrow path leading to its bottom.

  To call it a path was generous. A ledge barely eight inches wide wrapped around all four sides, descending at an angle that only a mountain goat would feel comfortable on. But even if the path had been ten feet wide, it wouldn’t have been an easy trip.

  The sinkhole from the acropolis surface had partially breached through the ceiling. Great mounds of debris had fallen into the sunken site, but the worst of the breach had been plugged by a giant statue whose outstretched arm had gotten caught on the stepwell’s edge. It now hung upside down above the pyramid, supporting a thousand tons of rock and dirt on its dulled, silver arm.

  Though larger than the statue of Bele?t-Imtu at the temple, it could otherwise be its twin, and Jasper had a sinking feeling the goddess had misled them again. Don’t tell me this is the statue she wants us to take? This thing makes the Statue of Liberty look like a blushing maiden.

  “You think it’s safe,” Erin interjected, breaking him out of his musing.

  “Safe?” S?ams?a?dur snorted derisively. “It’s a miracle it hasn’t fallen yet, but I don’t want to be here when it does.”

  “It’s lasted a few centuries,” Nissila?t objected primly. “There’s no reason to think it won’t make it a few more minutes.”

  Jasper groaned. “Don’t jinx it?”

  “Jinx?”

  He ignored her question as his attention focused on the narrow ledge leading into the gloom below. From the top, he couldn’t tell if the bottom had been completely buried by the fallen debris or if the statue had blocked enough of the landslide to leave some space open. Guess there’s only one way to tell.

  “I don’t think we should risk the ledge,” he said. “There’s no guarantee it isn’t broken somewhere we can’t see, but even if it isn’t, if any of us fall, we’ll be the ones broken. I can fly two of us there and check out the bottom. Hopefully, the ritual site is still accessible.” And if it isn’t… Jasper shrugged the thought away. He had no idea what they’d do if they were unable to fulfill the goddess’ request. Despite her claims of weakness, she’d shown she still possessed a considerable amount of power, and he wasn’t keen on angering her. But if they couldn’t reach it…well, he wasn’t going to stick around forever, fighting off hordes of undead. Hopefully, it was a bridge they wouldn’t need to cross.

  As he cast Spectral Wings on himself and Ihra, Tsia joined them at the ledge. “I’m coming with you,” she said, cutting him off before he could speak. “We don’t know what to expect down there. There could be a monster down there, a dead god-”

  “Glad you’re coming.”

  She stuttered to a stop, blinking owlishly when he didn’t object. “You don’t want me to babysit these guys?”

  “Hey!” S?ams?a?dur objected grumpily, while Nissila?t narrowed her eyes.

  Jasper glanced down at the wreckage below them, and shook his head. “Ideally, we’d bring everyone, but I’m not confident in our ability to navigate those ruins with somebody in our arms, so it’s best if it’s just the three of us. But you’re right - I don’t think this goddess is trying to hurt us exactly, but we’ve been surprised every step along the way. It wouldn’t shock me at all if there’s some trial or challenge or fight waiting for us, so, yeah, I’m happy to have you. Unless, of course,” he added with a twinkle in his eye, “you prefer to babysit?”

  Tsia threw herself off the ledge, plunging a dozen feet into the yawning abyss before the winds rose around her and she jerked to a stop. “Just try and make me,” she called back teasingly, before descending deeper into the pit.

  “Any objections,” Jasper asked, turning back to the others.

  “Just hurry,” the durgu replied shortly. “The creatures are getting closer. If we don’t leave soon, we’ll have to fight our way out.”

  Jasper hesitated, casting another glance at the chasm as he tried to decide if they could safely carry the others with them. “How close are we talking?”

  “Just go,” S?ams?a?dur said. “If worst comes to worst, I have a few new tricks up my sleeve after my talk with your goddess. I can distract them for a little while.”

  “We’ll make it quick then.” Hesitating no longer, Jasper threw himself over the edge and tucked his wings into a dive. The wind that rose to meet him was cold and fetid, oxygen-starved air filled with the scent of rot. He spiraled to the left, dodging a mound of fallen debris, before darting through the crook of the statue’s arm and slipping down the side of the stepwell.

  He caught up with Tsia and Ihra quickly, and the three continued their descent into the inky depth as he lit the way with his fire. More of the pit had been clogged with debris from above than he’d realized, and they were forced to turn around and search for another way down more than once, but eventually the bottom loomed below them.

  Like the temple, the floor was made of a piece of solid clear crystal so unimaginably large and perfect that it could only have been formed by magic. But this one had not escaped the ravages of time. Boulders from the sinkhole had bombarded it, leaving the ground as cratered and shattered as the moon’s surface - everywhere, that is, save for a single area.

  A floating circle of lapis lazuli, suspended by no visible means, occupied the heart of the inverted pyramid. Hundreds of arcane glyphs wrapped around its rim, with a dull blue still emanating from most, while in the center, behind the opaque wards sat an odd collection.