The voice whispers like a lover, brushing against my ear and raising the hairs at the nape of my neck. The words should be off-putting, but I’m too bewitched by the voice to turn back now.
Even if I were, it wouldn’t matter because my familiar slips past me before heading down the steps, like forgotten subterranean chambers are not at all scary or troubling. As he descends, mounted torches flare to life, revealing a long set of stairs and a hallway far below.
“Nero!” I call out. I’m supposed to be the one taking the risks here with the strange voice, not my familiar.
If he hears my voice, he doesn’t listen. My familiar disappears, and while I can still hear torches lighting somewhere beyond my line of sight, the sound grows more and more distant, presumably as the panther moves deeper into the chamber.
“Nero!” I call out again.
Nothing.
I slip into his mind just to make sure he’s okay. One second, I’m staring down at the dark opening, and in the next, I’m inside, prowling forward, claw tips clicking against the stone flooring. Through Nero’s eyes, I see massive walls and flickering shadows, and I can smell…something.
Something alive.
In an instant, I’m back in my own head.
I had understood that some being was behind the magic and the voice that called to me. Still, it’s obvious this place has been long forgotten, bound in wards that have outlasted the spellcasters themselves.
And yet, despite the forgotten state of this place, something still lingers here alongside these wards, something sentient and magical, and my brand-spanking-new familiar is heading straight for it.
Not good, not good, not good.
Before I can think better of it, I plunge down those stairs after Nero, following the torchlight and the trail of indigo magic.
About halfway down, I notice how dry everything is. Even the air, which was so humid aboveground, is parched here. On either side of me, torches flicker and hiss, giving off not just the smell of smoke but also frankincense and cinnamon.
I trail my fingers over the walls, where I see the iridescent sheen of spells. The same magic I met earlier is here again, hanging heavy in the air. I don’t believe it belongs to that disembodied voice, but that only deepens the mystery. The power fills the space, coating the air and walls like honey, and the blue magic seems to twist and contort—just a little—around it. Odd.
Odder still, I sense it’s supposed to keep people away, and yet it seems to welcome me, brushing against my flesh like the softest silk.
Once I get to the bottom, I cast my gaze down the long hallway in front of me. It curves out of sight, that ribbon of magic disappearing with it.
“Nero?” I call.
Nothing.
I look back up the stairs and give the sky one last remorseful look before continuing.
The walls here are carved with images of trees and beasts and warriors on horseback, the firelight and shadows making them dance. Draped over it all are more shimmery webs of spells.
Farther down the hall, the images give way to lines of text. The letters seem to jiggle a little as I look; the words themselves are spells. The writing appears to be…Latin. However, the longer I stare, the more I realize this is not actually Latin.
It’s the Latin alphabet but not the actual Latin language.
And the only reason I know that is because I can read this text.
I say a line out loud. “…azkagu wek div’nusava. Ipis ip’nasava udugab…”
…bind fast within. Keep safe for all eternity…
One of the nearby spells flares to life, stirred by my invocation.
My eyes pass over the rest of the text. Whatever this language is, it’s something else, something from far away and long ago that seems to make my blood sing and my heart awaken.
An itchy, restless feeling stirs beneath my skin. It’s that same feeling I get when I come across a hole in my memory. I feel turned inside out.
There may be things I can no longer remember, but then there are things I do inexplicably know.
Latin is one of them.
Latin and apparently whatever this language is.
I want to linger here and read this spellwork, just to taste this language on my tongue again. It…evokes some dear but unnamable emotion in me, something I’ve only felt in dreams.
But the longer I stand still, the more that blue magic coils around me. I can now sense the presence it belongs to beckoning me closer.
I tear my attention away from the wall and move on.
The narrow hall eventually opens into a chamber as large as my apartment, the entire space already lit by torches.
The room is decorated from top to bottom with more writing and images of fantastical beasts. I see griffins and deer with antlers that morph into the branches of nearby trees. I only spare it all a passing glance.
It’s what lies at the center of the room that grabs my attention.
Nero lounges on a massive block of white marble, the stone intricately carved to resemble a massive tree trunk. The fae who surely carved this went to great lengths to capture the texture of the bark and even what appear to be tree rings on the exposed end.
The trail of magic ends there, disappearing into the carved stone through a seam that runs the length of it.
It’s not simply a block of stone stylized to look like a massive felled tree.
It’s a sarcophagus, and this chamber, a crypt.
And yet…there’s something alive in this place. Something that lies in that stone coffin beneath Nero.
Horror rises in me as I muse on that. Whatever’s inside that coffin is alive enough to call to me.
How long have they been trapped here?
My queen…
Goose bumps pebble along my skin. The voice is so much louder and more intimate here in this room.
At last, you have come…
It is only now that I realize this voice has not been speaking to me in English. I just understood it as such. In fact, I understood it so well that I hadn’t even thought to question what language it was. But I think it’s the same one written on the walls.
That deep-blue magic pushes at my back, interrupting my thoughts and urging me toward the sarcophagus.
A chill sweeps over me as, reluctantly, I return my gaze to that coffin. As though I can’t help myself, I step closer.
Nero stands then and hops off the lid, exposing a smooth rectangular section of marble inscribed with more lines of text, though it’s hard to make out what it says from here. Ropes and ropes of spells cover the entire sarcophagus, the torchlight flickering off the phantom sheen of them.
The sheer quantity of spells looks excessive, but then, I don’t know what sort of being it contains, only that they were able to lure me here while trapped beneath it all.
I lick my dry lips, more of my misgivings bubbling up. I close the last of the distance to the coffin, peering down at the lid.