“Rrraaiinnn,” Leira sang. “It’s always raining in the… Stormlands.”

  “It’s wild that we can hear the storm all the way down here,” Cort said as they descended a ramp. “Alright. We’re going in circles.”

  They’d been wandering these eerie metal halls for some time, and the place had not proven as scandalous as Leira had expected. It truly appeared to be nothing more than a big storage area.

  They’d checked a couple dozen rooms, spread over two different levels. Most were filled with food, an amazing variety of food, really, including some exotic delicacies that Leira had never seen before. And that was saying something, since she was a princess with a refined palate. So far, she’d respected Cort’s request that they not stop to eat, except for the trays of sushi they’d snacked on while walking.

  A few other rooms held building materials, medical supplies, and other mundane things. Nothing too alarming. Most surprising? No weapons.

  The place was suspiciously large though, especially considering the circumstances of these Stormlands. Leira didn’t exactly agree with Cort’s claim that they were going in circles. Rather this place was just a maze.

  She felt sure that no one was pursuing them—those warriors were always shouting and banging on their shields, and these halls were as silent as the grave. She didn’t know what to make of that.

  Instinct (and logic) told her to expect something worse ahead, but no point worrying until something actually happened.

  There were definite signs of activity, though. Most of the storage closets had missing goods. They’d found a few dollies and such, placed in ways that suggested recent usage. The biggest clue was the inventory sheets they’d come across—pristine white pages with no sign of age.

  “Maybe the Stormfolks just found this place and decided they hit the jackpot. They’re just living large on all this free stuff.”

  Leira fiddled with her eyeflower. She’d thought that too, until… “Some of this stuff is new, though. I recognized that brand of milk. I used to buy it at the grocery store. And why aren’t they coming after us?”

  As they approached another T-shaped intersection, Cort flipped a doubloon—heads was right, tails was left.

  “Right,” he said.

  Reaching the intersection, they both stopped in their tracks and gasped. In her shock, Leira accidentally released a puff of white spores from her eyeflower.

  “Fuck the coin,” Cort said, flicking it away over his shoulder.

  To the right, more bare metal hallway, lined with boring closets. To the left, a massive chamber with a gigantic machine in the center.

  Leira clapped her hands together. “Now we’re talking.”

  ***

  Quez chewed a twist of tobacco—he’d been chaining them nonstop—as he stared down at the shards of green glass scattered around his feet. Lall stood beside him, rocking back and forth on her heels, the way she always did when she was nervous.

  As Sworn Guardian, Quez had been made privy to all of Malikau’s secrets.

  Or so he’d thought. This didn’t make any sense.

  He raised his eyes to again regard the blue-lit hallway, the entry framed by jagged fragments of shattered glass. The hall went further than his eye could see. The air within felt cold. Goosebumps pimpled Quez’s skin.

  Strange, perfect metal, as smooth as glass. Unnatural light. A discordant humming sound, barely audible.

  Quez licked his lips, aware that he’d been silent for too long. His warriors surrounded him, their stilted breaths betraying their anxiety.

  “Has anyone entered?” Quez asked.

  “No, Guardian,” said Atla, one of the wing leaders. “I forbade entry. This passage was protected by an image of the Elder Warden.”

  Of course, Quez thought. He knew that. He himself had uttered many prayers to this very icon whilst on duty when he was still green.

  It would’ve been wise to hide his shock at this sight, but he’d already failed to do so.

  “I didn’t…” Alta continued.

  Quez turned to face the wing leader. “Easy, Atla. You acted with wisdom.”

  “I allowed demons to enter a sanctuary of the Warden,” Atla said bitterly.

  “We all allowed that.” Quez bit off the end of the twist and chewed it. “You did well. This is a time for caution.”

  Quez had led them to their deaths. The thought of his warriors sharing in his guilt sickened him. But he had to feign strength. And keep faith in Warden Tezca.

  “What are your orders?” Lall said, trying to prompt Quez to action and spare him from further shame.

  “The Warden and the Jaguars are occupied,” Quez announced. “They are tending to the suspected breach in the Oubliette. That work is most crucial, or we may have a horde in our midst.”

  A collective shiver stole through the battered warriors. If just two demons were capable of all this…

  Did you know this story is from Royal Road? Read the official version for free and support the author.

  Quez turned away from the glowing hallway to face them. Wide-eyed, ghost white faces stared back. Many were covered in the blood of their brothers and sisters. Some nursed wounds.

  Lall covertly squeezed Quez’s hand.

  He took a deep breath and made his decision as he started speaking. “But we cannot ignore the possibility that the demons sought this hidden sanctuary with intent. This may well be a secret that the Warden protects. We must enter.

  “I will lead a small team into this passage. Atla, you and two of your warriors will accompany myself and Lall. Choose your two fastest runners.”

  “Guardian, you should not risk your-,” Atla said.

  Quez cut in. “No. Your two fastest. Thank you. I will not feed more souls to these voracious demons. We will track our enemies and discover the nature of this secret place.” Quez breathed deep but faltered into a sigh. “Defend yourselves and treat the wounded until we return. I swear on the Goddess I will send word.”

  Atla chose her two warriors. Five in all. That felt right. The sacred number of the Jaguar.

  The five of them crossed the threshold, entering the cold embrace of the strange blue light.

  ***

  To Cort, the machine resembled an enormous lightbulb. The elongated glass dome was three stories tall and thirty meters wide. It spanned the round chamber, leaving space only for a walkway that circled the perimeter.

  The dome’s shape was elliptical, almost like an ear of corn cut in half longways. Within the glass, at the right-side end, was a round metal platform, its surface traced by a complex pattern of circuitry. From that platform, running the length of the dome, was a big cylindrical pipe with a diameter of five meters.

  The thing looked absurdly complicated. Most of the pipe was covered over by a ridged black material—some type of shielding. But in some sections, the innards were exposed—perhaps for ventilation—revealing a mess of conduits, filaments, and wires. There was a load of different metals—gold, silver, copper—all cobbled together into bizarre shapes. Lights blinked within, but the mechanisms were still, and there was something disconcerting about that.

  The pipe disappeared into the other end of the dome. The glass there, in the leftmost third, was completely covered by the black shielding material.

  “Ooo!” Leira squealed, skipping ahead. “These are rare!”

  “What is it?” Cort asked, readying his hammer and scanning the room as he followed her.

  “A teleporter,” Leira said. She made for the large computer terminal stationed near the midpoint of the dome.

  Cort’s eyes widened. “Really? I’ve heard of those. Never thought I’d see one.”

  Leira grinned at him over her shoulder. “Betcha don’t know about this kind. These big ones are rare-rare. They’re special because they can teleport living things without killing them. Even people.”

  “Eh? Yeah, definitely never heard of that.”

  The computer was active. There were six monitors, and below them a control panel with about a thousand buttons. The screens displayed inscrutable data and graphics. Huge cables ran from the terminal, through ports in the dome, into a connector inside the teleporter that was the size of a house.

  Next to the terminal, a metal door was embedded in the side of the dome. A glass tunnel ran from it, through the inside of the dome, connecting via hatch to the base of the platform.

  “Even this crazy thing, and they’re still not guarding it,” Cort said as he set down all their packs. He rolled his shoulders out. When he looked up, Leira was pressing buttons on the computer.

  “What are you doing?” Cort hissed, sputtering because of his missing teeth. “Don’t touch that!”

  “Relax, I know how the normal ones work. They’re quite simple on the user’s end. This one doesn’t seem too different.”

  “That doesn’t mean you should use it. What are you even trying to do? And why do you know so much about Leviathan shit?”

  Leira looked back at him. “Isn’t it obvious, Cortemius? I was a princess.”

  Cort’s breath caught. That wasn’t a huge leap. He’d assumed something like that after what Gwil had told him, but still, he didn’t know what to say. That centipede bitch— “Is she your mom?” he blurted.

  “No. Not biologically.” Leira waved him over. “Look, I’m not doing anything crazy. But we wanna see what’s going on here, don’t we?” She pointed at one of the monitors.

  The screen was black and displayed a single line of white text that read: Hey, can you send over some lobster bisque?

  “Wait,” Cort said. “Did you already send it? Don’t.”

  “Why not?”

  “It’s suspicious. Lobster is the one thing we know they have naturally here. Ask for something else. Anything else. Something less stupid.”

  “Ahh,” Leira said, wagging her finger at him. “Good call. Damn. Anesidyra tried for ages to get an organismal-grade teleporter, and even she couldn’t get her hands on one. Why the fuck have they got one here?”

  “Beats me,” Cort said. “But let’s consider our options before we mess with it. Aren’t you worried about drawing the Leviathan here? That Queen is hunting you, isn’t she?”

  Leira got in his face, the petals of her eyeflower swirling like a kaleidoscope. “We need to find out why Gwil got a spike stuck through his heart. I’ll do whatever it takes. But do you think I’m some kind of idiot? We’re gonna use it, find out what we can, and then destroy it right away.” She grinned. “Teleporters are fragile.”

  “Alright, yeah,” Cort said. “But ask for something more important than food.”

  Leira’s face fell into a scowl. “Like what?”

  “I dunno,” Cort said. “Medicine?”

  “Uhh, alright,” Leira said. Cort saw a smirk form on her lips as she typed on the keyboard.

  New text appeared on the monitor: Hello. This is an emergency. I have contracted syphilis. Please send penicillin ASAP (as soon as possible).

  Leira finished typing and looked up at him.

  Cort shrugged. “Seems good.”

  Leira sent the message. The cursor blinked on the screen as they waited.

  Cort tongued at the unfamiliar gap in his teeth. “Hey, is this tech how warpships work?”

  “No. There’s some connection, I’m sure. But these are a lot safer. The warpships rip open the fabric of reality or some shit. But they can go anywhere. This is just a two-way bridge. Also, warpship travel sucks up like a billion doubloons worth of Kaia every time. Teleporters are practically free in comparison.”

  The computer terminal beeped. A new message appeared: Communication from the Malikauan end of this bridge is prohibited. King Yuma has been alerted.

  Leira clicked her tongue. Her fingers flurried across the keyboard as she typed four words: Eat my shit, asshole.

  “Wait, don’t!” Cort shouted. He grabbed her wrist. Too late.

  “Aww, fuck me!” Leira spat. “Sorry. That passive-aggressive tone pissed me off. I always construe text in the worst possible way. It’s something I need to work on, but-”

  “Leira, shut up,” Cort said. “What do we do?”

  As Leira opened her mouth to answer, they heard something.

  The soft footsteps of someone—someones—sneaking, coming down the metal hallway.

  Cort loaded himself up with all their stuff and then ran to the entrance of the chamber where he found himself nearly face-to-face with five warriors.

  As soon as they saw each other, two of the warriors turned and sprinted in the opposite direction.

  The man at the center held his arms out in front of the two women beside him. Cort recognized this jobber from earlier. He wore a big, obnoxious eagle headdress.

  Cort pointed at them. “Take one more step and I’ll kill all of you.”

  “Cort!” Leira screamed. “The teleporter!”

  He whipped around.

  The machine had come alive. The mechanisms within the pipe whirled at such speed that the whole thing was a blur. Crackling bolts of Kaia flickered across the shielding.

  Cort had a hard time reckoning with the silence. Logically, he knew the dome just had good soundproofing. But it was disturbing to witness such an obvious eruption of power while hearing nothing.

  The web of circuitry on the platform glowed blinding bright.

  For an instant, the room went utterly black, and something rippled through the air.

  When the light returned, ten Leviathan soldiers stood on the platform.