The Fanged Crown: The Wilds (29 page)

“We’ve already met you,” Verran said curtly. “We met your husk.” .

Liel turned white. “Oh no. What did it do?”

“Nothing,” Harp said quickly. “There was little contact, and we learned the truth soon enough.”

“We have to stop him,” Liel said angrily. “Stop him from making more husks and stealing the Torque, and whatever else the bastard is planning.”

“Cardew?” Harp asked.

“Cardew’s just a puppet,” Liel said bitterly. “He has a patron. A man named Tresco, who has been orchestrating events here in Chult.”

Harp felt his heart beating rapidly in his chest. Just like that, his torturer had a name. The man who had chained him down and mutilated him had an identity, just like anyone else. When he thought of the gray-haired man as Tresco, his memory seemed less potent somehow. Harp had the irrational thought that it was easier to kill a man with a name.

Or at least it was easier to track him down and then kill him.

“Are you all right?” Liel asked, taking his hand. She was watching Harp’s face closely.

“Tresco is the man who tortured me at Vankila,” Harp said. “We knew him as the Practitioner.”

“I knew that Tresco ran … affairs at the prison, but I didn’t know he did it himself,” Liel said, laying her hand on Harp’s arm.

“Wait,” Boult said. “Tresco Maynard? He was Anais’s son’s tutor.”

“At the Winter Palace?” Harp frowned. Boult nodded. “It was Ysabel, Cardew, and Tresco that survived.”

“So, maybe Cardew’s not just a puppet in this particular scheme,” Harp said. “Maybe he’s been a puppet all along.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised,” Liel said. “Tresco wants the throne in the hands of a ruler he can control. One whoU chase anyone not human from Tethyr and give him all the power he wants. That’s not a plan that happens overnight.”

“Why does Tresco want the Torque?” Kitto asked.

“I’m not sure exactly,” Liel told them. “It suppresses magic somehow.”

“That doesn’t seem very useful,” Verran said dismissively.

“Majida told me that the Torque shields the wearer. But from what I’ve overheard it sounds like it prevents spells from being cast,” Liel said. “It’s possible whoever wears the Torque can cast spells, but no else can. That seems very useful to me. And to Tresco.”

“Am I feeling the effects of the Torque?” Verran asked. “It feels like I wouldn’t be able to cast a spell, even if I wanted to.”

“I think so,” Liel said. “I feel that too.”

“Then we must be close to it,” Boult said. “Let’s quit chatting and get it.”

“Can you take us to the Torque?” Harp asked.

“Unfortunately, I can’t,” Liel said. “Come and see.”

ŚŠŚŚŠŚ •ŠŚŚŠŚ ŚŠ•

A crystal clear lake blocked the path to the Torque. As if it were a giant cup filled with water, the vast hall under the golden dome was completely submerged. They’d entered the hall from the balcony and stood on a whispering gallery ringing the perimeter of the cylindrical palace.

Directly under the dome, the gallery was the highest point in the hall, but the water lapped gently under the walkway, making it feel more like a dock than a lofty perch.

“As you can see, there’s a water problem,” Liel said.

The dome was completely smooth on the outside, but he inside had slender golden trusses made from twisted metal that radiated from its apex down to the gallery where they stood. The base of the dome was so close that Harp could reach up and touch the metal, which had been enchanted to permit light to permeate its surface. The golden sheen radiating from the dome gave off heat, and the hall was as warm and as bright as if they were standing directly under the sun. Where other buildings were crumbling, the dome was solid, and kept the debris from outside out of the water that filled the hall.

Harp leaned over the crumbling railing and peered down into the water. It was clear enough to see all the way down to the blue and white floor of the hall. From where he stood in the gallery, he could just see the top of the arched doorway and the glitter of silver stones that had been set into it, a mirror image of what they had seen outside when they stood in front of the palace.

“No wonder the Scaly Ones didn’t want anyone opening the door from the outside,” Harp said. “They’d get a face full of water.”

“They were serious about protecting the Torque,” Boult agreed. “Even if we can get rid of the water, is there any way down from the gallery?”

“There’s a ramp over there,” Liel said, pointing across the water to a stone ramp that arched from the gallery to a large gilded pillar in the center of the hall. The ramp spiraled down the massive pillar, which was inlaid with a geometric pattern of turquoise and gold tiles. The ramp continued down through a circular opening in the floor below until it disappeared into watery darkness.

“Can either of you cast something and drain the water?” Harp asked Liel and Verran, who shook their heads.

“I’ve tried it,” Liel told him. “Nothing happens. It feels so dead and cold.”

“Majida said the Torque was below the entrance hall,” Harp said. “Can we just swim down?”

“I don’t think we can hold our breath that long,” Verran said.

“Have you searched for a lever or a switch that might empty the water out of the hall?” Boult asked Liel.

Liel shrugged. “Thoroughly, but that doesn’t mean much in this place. There’s nothing obvious, but the sarrukh were clever architects. It could take a lifetime to find.”

“It’s all we can do. Let’s spread out,” Harp said. “Kitto and Verran, check along the railing. Boult and Liel, check the walls. I’ll go over the floor. Go carefully. Anything that looks strange, call it out.”

Mosaics adorned the wall of the whispering gallery, and the intricate tile patterns were unblemished despite the years since their creation. In a display of skillful arti-sanship, the rich array of colors illustrated the history of the sarrukh. They didn’t seem to tell a sequential history, though. Harp passed one panel that depicted an army of serpentfolk sweeping across a grassy meadow like a plague of locusts. The next panel showed basking serpentfolk surrounded by piles of gold in a verdant jungle.

As Harp progressed down the gallery, the mosaics became more grisly, as the sarrukh chronicled their fondness for mass slaughter and mayhem—chained humans being decapitated, chained humans clearing rocks from a pit, and chained humans hauling massive stones up a mountain under a swirling gray sky while the overseers whipped them. Harp stopped paying attention to the walls and focused on searching the floor. But Boult couldn’t take his eyes off the macabre scenes plastered on the wall.

“Those are pleasant,” Boult said sarcastically.

Boult continued down the curve of the wall until he came to a panel that showed dwarves in bondage being led out of a cave by serpentfolk. A line of dwarf heads were mounted on pikes along a rocky ridge. Dwarf men were laid out on the ground in a line as yuan-ti prepared to roll a massive stone over them and crush them to death.

“Boult!” Harp called. He could see a thin, silver cord nestled in between two rows of tile and obscured by grit and dust. “I think I’ve found something.”

Walking back to Harp, Boult leaned down and picked up a hunk of rock from the floor.

“What are you doing?” Harp asked. Boult tossed it up in the air and caught it as if to size up the weight of the stone.

“Expressing my disgust,” Boult said vehemently, hurling the rock at the mosaic of the subjugated dwarfs.

There was a loud pop as the rock smashed into the mosaic. But instead of a crashing noise, they heard a short rush of air, like a sharp intake of breath. Then the mosaic rippled the way water does when a pebble is dropped into it. Harp only had time to register the strange undulation of the stones before the colorful tiles exploded off the wall in a spray of ceramic slivers and thick white dust. Like a wall of knives, the shards blasted into the air as Boult scrambled backward away from the projectiles. With no target to hit, the shards splashed harmlessly in the water.

“Everyone all right?” Harp asked after a moment of shock. Boult had been the closest to the explosion, but he had backed far enough out of range to avoid getting sliced. Liel, Verran, and Kitto had been on the other side of the gallery and safely out of range.

“I think I found a trap,” Boult said dryly.

“Good thing you didn’t hit it with a hammer,” Kitto called across the water.

Harp walked cautiously up to the wall. The red stones of the outer wall were still intact, and there was no sign of the plaster that secured the tiles to the wall. It was as if the mosaic had never been there at all.

“Why would they trap the wall?” Boult asked.

“To keep anyone from breaking through it from the outside?” Verran suggested, walking up behind them.

“To keep anyone from throwing rocks at their precious artwork?” Liel said.

“It doesn’t matter why, just don’t touch any more walls,” Harp said. “Or anything else.”

“What were you trying to show me, Harp?” Boult asked. “Before I distracted you with my exploding wall trick?”

Harp pointed at the line that ran between the tiles. “I wondered if that was a trap. Having seen that, I’m going to say yes.”

They continued the search of the gallery, but there were no levers to be found. When the group reassembled, they were dusty and disgusted by the atrocities immortalized on the brightly colored walls. But the hall below them was still filled with water.

“Any other ideas?” Harp said. “Did Cardew ever mention the water in the palace?”

“No, but I heard him tell Tresco that they couldn’t get to the Torque,” Liel said. “And with the Torque disrupting spells in here, I imagine that even Tresco would have had difficulty in getting rid of the water.”

“Harp,” Kitto called from the other side of the gallery. “Look at that one.”

Kitto stood in front of a mosaic showing a serpent with the head of a bird and ram’s horns. It clutched a black key in its hooked beak. Surrounded by blue water, the creature was swimming down through a shaft of sunlight to a familiar-looking arched doorway and the silver lock in the center.

“That’s the door to the palace,” Kitto said, pointing to

the image of the doorway. “And that’s the creature that’s carved on the panels outside.”

“Maybe you can open the door from the inside, if you have that key,” Liel said.

“But we don’t have the key,” Verran pointed out. “And we know it’s not hidden on the gallery, because we just searched. And the door is still underwater. Maybe we should leave and look for a way to the surface.”

“Without the Torque?” Liel asked.

“Unless you have the key, and you’re not telling us,” Verran snapped.

“Are you feeling all right?” Harp asked Verran.

“We’re not getting anywhere,” Verran said, a whine creeping into his voice. “I want to go back to the boat.”

“It isn’t over yet,” Harp said patiently. “We have to try and see it through.”

Verran stalked away, and Liel raised her eyebrows.

“He’s exhibiting some powerful magic,” Harp told Liel quietly. “I don’t think he knows how to control it. I’m concerned about him.”

“He’s not going to be able to do magic inside the palace. I couldn’t make a stone glow, not against the force of the Torque.”

“I can do it,” Kitto said.

“Do what?” Harp asked. “Make a stone glow?”

“Pick the lock and open the door. You know I can.”

“Yes, you’re amazing,” Harp agreed. “On the safety of land! By the time you swim down to the door, you’ll barely have enough air to get back up.”

“I can do it, Harp,” Kitto insisted. “You know I’m a good swimmer.”

“Why don’t we try to open it from the outside?” Harp asked.

“The niferns aren’t just going to sit and watch me,” Kitto pointed out. “Listen. They’re going crazy out there.”

The scaly dogs were making more noise than they had been, and it sounded like a large pack had amassed below the balcony. They were making scratchy, yelping sounds, and getting louder with every passing moment.

“I’ll go see what they’re doing,” Verran said, and he walked outside onto the balcony.

“Besides, we checked the door from the outside,” Kitto reminded Harp. “There was no lock remember?”

“He’s right,” Boult said.

“Then let me swim down and try,” Harp said.

“You’re not as good of a swimmer as me,” Kitto said honestly. He loosened the clasp on his cloak and let it drop on the ground around his feet. Kitto leaned down to unlace his boots. “And besides, you’re kind of old.”

“I’m not old!” Harp protested.

“You know I’m right,” Kitto said, pulling out a cracked leather case that held his lockpick tools. “No one does locks like me.”

“If it’s sealed with magic, then you may need a magic key,” Harp said petulantly. Kitto ignored him and emptied the contents of his backpack on the ground. He began stuffing large pieces of rock from the remains of the railing into his pack.

“What are you doing?” Harp demanded as he racked his brain for a way to keep the boy on dry land.

“Making sure I’ll sink,” Kitto said, looking up at Harp with his crooked little smile.

“Harp’s right,” Liel agreed. “The lock itself is probably enchanted.”

“Then I get down there and can’t open it. I’ll just swim back up.”

“Or drown trying,” Harp said darkly when Kitto had finished filling the bag with rocks. “Which is what it looks like you’re planning to do.”

“I need both hands free,” Kitto pointed out, shutting the

clasps on the backpack, and struggling to lift it onto his shoulders.

“I don’t like it,” Harp insisted.

“I can do it,” Kitto said.

Verran came dashing into the room, sword in hand. “Whatever we’re doing, let’s hurry. There are four Jumpers headed our way.”

“How close?” Boult demanded.

“They’re at the top of the causeway,” Verran told them. “They’re nearly at the palace.” “Just let me try,” Kitto urged.

Harp relented. “Don’t be stupid about it. If it won’t open, give it up. And come help us fight.”

Kitto nodded and swung his leg over the railing where he paused for a moment. Harp felt a rush of protectiveness and opened his mouth to stop the boy, but Kitto was too quick for him.