A Thief in the Night

chapter Sixty-four

Croy signaled for Mörget to come forward. It looked like the way was clear. They had been traveling for miles through empty halls and dusty corridors, intentionally staying away from any place that looked like it might have been recently occupied. It wasn’t difficult—the enormous volume of the Vincularium seemed mostly to be deserted, unused for centuries. However many elves might still live, there certainly weren’t enough of them to fill the place up. So far they’d seen no more elves or demons or revenants or anything else.

Croy imagined that a paltry few survivors must be clinging to life in some tiny corner of the vast place, as afraid of the haunted corridors as he had been. He thought of how they had blundered through the place, all through its long night, and not seen any elves at all until the dwarven sun had come to life. Perhaps if they’d been quicker, if they hadn’t been separated by the revenants, they could have gotten into the place, killed one of the demons, and gotten out before the elves even knew they were there. How he longed it had been so. Mörget would have been satisfied, his manhood thoroughly proven. He and Cythera could have left without incident. This whole adventure could have been over in a few hours. Something they could laugh about whenever they recalled it in their later life, something to tell their grandchildren about.

Instead, now, he had slogged for hours through a place that offered death at every turning.

He estimated they had come halfway around the central shaft, and passed through miles of dark rock, when they came into the dormitory level.

He gestured for Mörget to follow him while he crept forward, seeking danger wherever it might hide. The two of them crept up a spiral ramp into the reddish light of this new level. A wide plaza opened onto another gallery before them. Croy stood well back from the opening on the central shaft—there was no telling who or what might be watching, and he tried to stay out of the light as much as possible.

Silently, he moved away from the gallery, deeper into the level. In his hand Ghostcutter moved back and forth, covering every shadow.

This place was supposed to be deserted—yet clearly it was not. The revenants on the top level, the demons on the lower floors, were not the only enemies he must be wary of. Elves might be the worst threat yet. They would be capable of subterfuge, of laying traps and ambushes. As he studied this new district he was constantly in fear of discovery.

He found himself in a place of narrow towers and squat structures that must have been residences for dwarves long since gone. It looked a great deal like the living quarters he’d seen in more modern dwarven cities—unadorned, perfectly functional, but far from what a human would have considered so. It differed only in that here there were so many more rooms than he was used to, so many that they had to be piled atop each other in great towers. He leaned in through the door of one of the low rooms and saw only scraps of rotting wood—what had been furniture, perhaps, centuries ago. Now it was nothing but rubbish. He stepped back outside and continued his search. Moving carefully through the red-lit lanes, he saw that outside each tower stood a spherical lamp on a pole. A fountain stood in the midst of the towers, its spouts crusted with white mineral deposits now, but the water still flowed. It smelled faintly of sulfur, but it was clear and free of scum. He stopped to take up a handful and scrub some of the grime off his face.

Ahead of him, Mörget clucked his tongue. A small sound, but in that empty place it made too many echoes. Croy hurried forward to chide his friend for disturbing the stillness.

Yet when he saw what Mörget had found, he let out a quiet sigh himself.

Lying on the flagstones was the body of a dwarf. The corpse’s face and hands had been slashed violently, and its blood pooled beneath it and ran away through the cracks between the flagstones. In the reddish light of the streetlamps, the blood looked almost black. An expression of utter terror had frozen on the poor dwarf’s face.

It was not Slag. “A dwarf, here? He didn’t come with us, and we know the builders of this place abandoned it long, long ago,” Croy whispered, shaking his head. “What does this mean? What is he doing here?”

“It means the Vincularium is getting crowded,” Mörget said, frowning. “Perhaps we were followed. Perhaps this dwarf came in on our heels, hoping to steal something of value while we fought the demon.”

Croy shook his head. “Dwarves don’t steal. Nor do they have any interest in their own history. Or at least, I thought they didn’t. There are abandoned dwarven cities and mines all over the continent, and I’ve never heard of dwarves returning to any of them before. Honestly, I was quite surprised when Slag said he wanted to come here. In my experience, dwarves are content to leave their old places to molder and collapse. Yet here we see evidence to the contrary—this dwarf must have come here for some good reason. But why? It’s a mystery. I’ll admit I’m confounded.”

“Does it really matter?” Mörget said.

“In times of danger, the unknown is one’s greatest enemy. At the very least I’d like to know how he died. If we knew who killed this dwarf, we might be better prepared when they come for us, next.” Croy knelt down to close the corpse’s eyelids. The flesh did not resist him. “He died recently,” he whispered. “He’s not even stiff yet. And these wounds weren’t made by your demon, I can tell that much. These are sword cuts.”

Mörget nodded but wasn’t looking at the body. He was staring down a side street. Croy looked and saw the end of a rope lying on the flagstones. It ran toward one of the towers, and then up its side.

“That looks like some kind of trap,” Croy suggested. “Dwarves make them all the time. Perhaps this poor fellow was hoping to catch his killer in it.”

Mörget approached the rope cautiously—then reached up and pulled it down, even as Croy waved his hands in warning. The rope fell with a thud from the top of the tower in an untidy coil. The other end was tied off in a loop to make a snare. “This trap was not set properly. There’s no counterweight,” he said.

Croy raised an eyebrow.

“In the East we make similar snares, for hunting,” Mörget explained. “You suggested the dwarf must have been setting this trap when he was killed. Which meant he wanted to ensnare someone up there.” The barbarian pointed at the top of the tower. “Maybe the killer came from on high.” Before Croy could stop him, Mörget scurried up the ladder.

Croy followed close behind, not wanting to get separated. When they reached the rooftop, he found it deserted and empty. Mörget gave the barest of glances around, then went to the edge of the roof to look down.

Croy took a slightly closer look—and found something that excited him. “Here,” he said, running a finger across a small grouping of pits in the stone at his feet. “Look! These marks were made by vitriol.” Mörget looked at him without comprehension. “Acid! I’ve seen similar spoor before, many times. Malden must have been here, holding Acidtongue. The blade drips its essence constantly, etching the floor wherever it’s drawn. Malden was here!”