“Really? Just passing through Dahlgren? To where in the world, might I ask, is Dahlgren on the way?”
“Just about everywhere depending on your perspective, don’t you think? I mean all roads lead somewhere, don’t they?” He was tired of being on the defensive and took a verbal swing. “Is there a reason you’re so interested?”
“I’m Sentinel Luis Guy and I’m in charge of managing the contest. I need to know if everyone participating is listed.”
“I already told you I wasn’t here for the contest.”
“So you did,” Guy said and slowly looked around at the others, taking particular notice of Magnus. “You are just passing through you said, but perhaps those traveling with you wish to be listed on the roll.”
A feint perhaps? Hadrian decided to parry anyway. “No one I’m with will want to be on that list.”
“No one you’re with?”
Hadrian gritted his teeth. It was a feint. Hadrian mentally scolded himself.
“So you’re not alone?” the sentinel observed. “Where are the others?”
“I couldn’t tell you.”
“No?”
Hadrian shook his head—less words less chance of mistakes.
“Really? You mean they could be washing over the falls right now and you couldn’t care less?”
“I didn’t say that,” Hadrian replied irritated.
“But you see no need to know where they are?”
“They’re grown men.”
The sentinel smiled again. “And who are these men? Please tell me so that I might inquire of them later perhaps.”
Hadrian’s eyes narrowed as he realized too late his mistake. The man before him was clever—too clever.
“Did you forget their names too?” Luis Guy inquired leaning forward in his saddle.
“No,” Hadrian tried to hold him off while he struggled to think.
“Then what are they?”
“Well,” he began wishing he had his own swords rather than a burrowed one. “Like I said, I don’t know where both of them are,” Hadrian spoke up. “Mauvin is here, of course, but I have no idea where Fanen has gotten to.”
“Surely you are mistaken. The Pickerings traveled with me and the rest of the entourage,” Guy pointed out.
“Yes they were, but they are planning on returning home with me.”
Guy’s eyes narrowed. “So you are saying that you traveled all the way out here alone—passing through, as you put it, and just happened to join up with the Pickerings?”
Hadrian smiled at the sentinel. It was weak, clumsy and the fencing equivalent of dropping his sword and tackling his opponent to the ground, but it was all he could do.
“Is this true, Pickering?”
“Absolutely,” Mauvin replied without hesitation.
Guy looked back at Hadrian. “How convenient for you,” he said, disappointed. “Well, then don’t let me keep you from your practice. Good day gentlemen.”
They all watched as the three men rode off toward the river trail.
“That was creepy,” Mauvin remarked staring off in their direction. “It can never be good when any sentinel takes an interest in you, much less Luis Guy.”
“What’s his story?” Hadrian asked.
“I really only know rumors. He’s a zealot for the church, but I know many even in the church who are scared of him. He’s the kind of person that can make kings disappear. He’s also rumored to be obsessed with finding the Heir of Novron.”
“Aren’t all seret?”
“According to church doctrine, sure. But he really is, which explains why he’s here.”
“And the two with him?”
“Seret, the Knights of Nyphron, they are the sentinel’s personal shadow army. They’re answerable to no king or nation, just to sentinels and the patriarch.”
Mauvin looked at Hadrian. “You might want to keep that sword. It looks like a bad time to be without your weapons.”
———
Although he had put his lantern out long before the creature’s return, Royce could see just fine. Light permeated the walls of Avempartha, seeping through the stone as if it were smoky glass. It was daylight outside, of that he was certain, as the color of light had changed from dim blue to soft white.
As the sun rose, the interior of the citadel became an illuminated world of wondrous color and beauty. Ceilings stretched in tall, airy arches, meeting hundreds of feet above the floor and giving the illusion of not being indoors at all but rather in a place where the horizon was merely lost in mist. The roar of the nearby cataracts, tamed by the walls of the tower, was a soft, muffled, undeniably soothing hum.
Thin gossamer banners hung from the lofty heights. Each shimmered with symbols Royce did not understand. They might have been standards of royalty, rules of law, directions to halls, or meaningless decorations. All Royce knew was that even in the wake of a thousand years, the detailed patterns still appeared fluid and vibrant. It was artistry beyond mortal hands, born of a culture unfathomable. Being the only elven structure Royce had ever entered, it was his only glimpse into that world and it felt oddly peaceful. Still and silent, it was beautiful. Although it looked nothing like anything Royce had ever seen, his reason fought against the growing sensation that somehow all this was familiar. Royce felt calm as he wandered the corridors. The very shapes and shadows touched chords in his mind he never realized were there. It all spoke to him in a language he could not understand. He only caught a word or a phrase in an avalanche of sensations that both mystified and captivated him as he wandered aimlessly like a man blinded by a dazzling light.
He walked from room to room, up stairs and across balconies, following no conscious course, but merely moving, staring and listening. Royce noticed with concern that every movement he made was recorded clearly in centuries of dust that blanketed the interior. Still, he was fascinated to discover that where he disturbed the dust, the floor revealed a glossy surface as clear as still water.
Passing through the various chambers, he felt as if he were in a museum, lost in a moment of frozen time. Plates were still out before empty chairs, some fallen on their sides—overturned in the confusion and alarm of nearly a millennium ago. Books lay open to pages someone had been reading nine hundred years before, yet Royce knew that even to that person who had sat there so long ago, this place, this tower, was ancient. Aside from its dramatic history, by its age alone Avempartha would be a monument—a sacred structure—to the elves, a link to an ancient era. This was not a citadel. He did not know how he knew, but he was certain this was something far more than a mere fortress.
Esrahaddon had left Royce almost immediately after entering the tower after pointing him in the direction he was now following. He told Royce he would find the sword he sought somewhere above the entrance, but that the wizard’s path led elsewhere. It had been hours now since they parted and the light outside was already starting to dim. Royce still had not found the sword. Sights and smells sidetracked him, including the musical sound the wind made as it passed through the spires overhead. It was too much to process at once, too much to classify, and soon he found himself lost.
He started to follow his trail in reverse when he discovered his footprints overlapped leaving him a path that moved in circles. He was starting to become concerned when he heard a new sound. Unlike everything he encountered so far, this noise was disturbing. It was the thick rhythmical resonance of heavy breathing.