The next morning, we got ready to march. Bandit was with us in the barracks and Mira made room in her pack for Bandit to be with her. I didn’t think taking a pet raccoon to an island infested with undead was such a good idea, but hey, what did I know? I knew better than to try to tell Mira what to do, though. Bran put her extra rations in his backpack. We packed like we were never coming back to the keep, which was altogether possible. Packing was also easy since we didn’t have much in the way of possessions, anyway. We did have almost all of the two hundred gold royals we each looted from the goblins, which would be badly needed once we got to the city on the sea. I still didn’t know the name of it, but I guessed it didn’t matter. We’d find out when we got there.

  Captain Doornail arranged for talon seven to be last in the marching order, and put Bran, me, Elle and Mira last in formation. As I waited, I found myself wondering how Grath had suddenly appeared to help us out like he did. Considering how rare his appearances in Stonekeep were, his timing was impossibly good. Did it have something to do with that little magical tug I felt when he got close? I didn’t think I would get an answer anytime soon, but it still made me wonder.

  Warleader Goodman was in the marshalling yard to see us off. His face was as completely blank as always. I tried not to look, but it appeared that he was avoiding looking at our talon, also. When the talons marched off, he went back inside the keep. We followed our talon until we were at the gates that separated the upper and lower cities, then Bran and I executed a left turn that Mira and Elle followed, and we marched along the inside of the upper city wall for a while, then turned into an alley. With the ruse finished, the others grasped my pauldrons. I had to look from side to side to make sure they were all in contact with me since I couldn’t feel their gauntleted hands. When I was satisfied, I focused my will and whooshed us to a rooftop I knew of that was close to the keep. I felt like I was getting better at this and that I could travel farther if I needed to, but now was not a time to take chances. I played it safe and whooshed up to the roof of the keep with my next try.

  Clenching my fist to try to rid myself of the pain the magic caused me, I activated the portal leading into the keep under the stern watch of the guardian golems. We all walked through, and I made sure the portal was deactivated the second we were all inside. I was not going to take any chances with the possibility of a Xerith being close by. When the portal faded out, we took a right turn and went past a circular portal chamber with multihued flowers that we never explored, then past a room full of golems on our left. I wished once again that I could control those golems. They could destroy the invading army without much trouble at all, I thought. We walked to the next circular chamber with the white flowers, and I activated the portal there. We stepped through the portal and walked through the golden doors to the throne room. It was just as majestic as we had left it.

  I sat on the Amber Throne a little awkwardly since I had my shield held on my left arm, my short sword in a sheath on my left hip and my new mace on a loop attached to my belt on my right side. I managed to sit without too much grinding against the flawless facets of the throne, though it seemed that contact with my weapons didn’t hurt the throne at all. I concentrated on the ruins again as I reached out to the throne with my magic. It immediately came into focus. I shifted the point of view a little lower, right next to the crumbling staircase going down. Though I didn’t really know what I was doing, I managed to use my connection to the throne to cause the portal on my left to open to that spot. A radiance erupted in the portal as it opened. I instinctively knew how to keep the portal open for only a few seconds and issued that magical command as the others walked through the portal. Then I quickly left the throne and walked through. After the usual jolt felt when going through a portal, we were right where we needed to be. In a few seconds we had just travelled as far as we could have walked in two to three months. It didn’t hurt me to use the portals, either. I could get used to this, I thought with a smile.

  “Do you feel that?” Bran asked.

  “Feel what?” Elle asked.

  “There’s intense evil below us,” Bran said. “I don’t know how I know, but I know.”

  “You can sense evil?” Mira asked. “What’s it feel like?”

  “Around the Warleader it was like a pinprick in my forehead along with the hair on the back of my neck wanting to rise,” Bran said.

  “I knew there was something bothering you,” Elle said. “You said nothing, though.”

  “I couldn’t let him know that I knew about his nature for obvious reasons,” Bran said. “Besides, whatever’s down there’s ten times worse.” Bran looked down at the ground with a frown.

  “All right,” I said. “What do you say we put our packs down right here? I don’t want to fight whatever’s down there with fifty pounds of stuff on my back.”

  “Great idea. We never would’ve thought of that,” Mira said cheekily. She had already set her shield aside and was reaching for the straps of her backpack.

  We all took our backpacks off. Bandit climbed out of Mira’s pack and scampered into the foliage beside the ruins. At least Bandit had some common sense, even if we didn’t. I kept my sword sheathed and drew out my new mace. It still had the illusion active, making it look like a common quality weapon. When I held it in my hand, I could feel a sort of hollow feeling from it, like it needed something. It had to be magic it needed. Before I went to battle with it, I needed to know how it worked.

  “Hold on a minute, guys,” I said.

  I tried to access magical power from the mace, but nothing happened. I thought again of the runes on the side of the shaft. Since fire magic came easily to me, I drew some more power from the source, which made me feel like my forearm was on fire, formed the magic into fire like I would if I were going to fling it at a goblin, but deliberately channeled it into the mace. The mace channeled that fire through it and the head of the mace burst into flame. The head of the mace was incredibly hot, but it didn’t make the handle hot. Well, now. This would turn out to be useful. Looking at the elemental glyphs etched into the handle, I thought I could probably feed it different elements as the situation warranted. The others were looking at the mace with a little bit of awe.

  “Careful with that thing, Jeron,” Bran said.

  “Yeah. Glad you’re on our side,” Mira mumbled as she loaded her crossbow. She left her shield by her pack, then held the crossbow at the ready.

  For the moment, I ceased the flow of power into the mace, and it obediently stopped burning. “Just experimenting,” I said. “I think you were right about someone leaving this by the throne for me, by the way. It’s like this weapon was made for me.”

  “Let’s see what’s below us, shall we?” Bran said.

  Bran drew his shortsword, hefted his shield, and waited by the partially collapsed staircase down. I joined him right away. Elle had her shortsword and shield at the ready and walked a pace or two behind Bran.

  “I’ll take the rear,” Mira said. “I plan to hide, just in case.”

  Seeing we were all ready, Bran navigated his way down the stairs first. They were made of stone and were worn down in the center from use but were also slightly eroded from rain runoff. There were pieces of stone blocks littering the stairs on the left-hand side, but we had a fairly easy time of getting down the stairs on the right. The staircase went down to the landing I had seen from afar. There was a big block of stone partially blocking the doorway to the basement that looked like it was supported by a couple of stacked stone blocks on the left side. The stone slab was easy to duck under, so we did that. The landing and the basement beyond were covered by sand and dirt, and the arches holding up the ceiling had a lot of cobwebs. There was something here. Something I couldn’t see that made my skin crawl, and I could feel my pulse quicken a little in response.

  Inside the basement, the light did not penetrate from the outside except for the little place where we were standing. It was very foul smelling in here, like something dead was rotting where it had been left. I thought this was a good time for some light, so I channeled some magical fire through my mace, making it light up with fire like a torch. Once we could see, Bran, Elle and I stayed close to the stairs to take stock of what was here. The basement here looked like it was the same size as the first floor above, and besides all the archways that supported the ceiling, the place was pretty empty. It looked like it was of a very sturdy construction. We couldn’t see the far side of the room, but I heard a whimper, like a wounded person would give. Then there was a rattle of chains. I held the mace a little bit higher and moved forward a little.

  Deeper inside, in a shadowy area behind the base of an arch, there was a shape on the floor. Speaking of the floor, it still had that weird, cleaned area in a circle around a slightly bigger pile of debris in the center of the basement. The accumulated dust of many years ended about ten feet into the room in a perfect arc extending into the darkness. It made me think that someone could pace around inside there, but there was a glass barrier or something keeping them inside.

  “Is someone there?” someone asked from the darkness. It sounded like a young woman. “Please help me!”

  “Who’s there? Show yourself!” Bran challenged.

  “Do you promise not to hurt me? He hurts me a lot! Please release me!” A woman weakly picked herself up from the ground and staggered closer to the light. She was chained to the base of an archway close to the center of the room. The woman had clearly been beaten from head to toe. She had dried blood sticking her hair together in a disheveled way, and she had a cut lip with dried blood still on her chin. She trembled with fear.

  Bran didn’t move forward from the dirty area of floor he occupied, so we held our ground. Mira took something out of a belt pouch and said a few words. With a quick gesture, a series of lights appeared here and there, illuminating the whole room. Elle gasped when she saw the woman and began to move forward to help, but Bran put an arm out to stop Elle’s progress. She looked at him with a question in her eyes.

  “I’m pretty sure that the woman there’s the source of evil in this place,” Bran said.

  “That’s crazy!” the prisoner said in a loud whisper. “Please help me! Release me before it gets back from hunting! It could be back any time now!”

  “Why hunt anything else when it already has you here?” Mira asked.

  “Please set me free!” the woman cried out. She pleaded pitifully. It really was moving, and Elle nearly went to her aid again.

  “I’m not buying it,” Bran said, his weapon at the ready.

  There was a long pause. The woman’s voice got deeper as she spoke. “Well, damnation. That ruins my fun.”

  There was a shimmering in the air around her, and the illusion of the woman disappeared. Standing there now was a thing out of nightmares that must have been nine feet tall. It was a dark brown color with blood red highlights on its scales. It was humanoid in shape with two arms and two legs, and it had horns and spikes jutting out of every body part it had, which included a long, thick tail with a large number of spikes at the end. Each of its powerful arms had a blade of bone sticking out of its wrist as long as a scimitar. The chain we saw before was a very real chain held in its clawed right fist.

  A really bad word slipped out of my mouth before I could stop myself.

  “A demon,” Bran said steadily. His posture was tense as a bowstring, but he didn’t back down. Elle glanced at him, steadied herself, and brought her shield up close by Bran’s right side. I did the same to Bran’s left.

  The fiend gave a tremendous yank on the chain, which went around the base of the arch, and pulled up out of the debris in a line going straight towards us! Bran, Elle, and I jumped aside in different directions only to realize the chain went past us to the stairway. Suddenly the smaller blocks that secured that bigger slab were pulled out, causing the granite block to slam to the ground, cutting off our escape with a cloud of dust.

  Another really bad word came out of my mouth.

  “Indeed,” the demon growled out, grinning evilly.

  With powerful tugs, the demon pulled the smaller stone block into the cleared circle of stone. It would have been completely dark in here had it not been for my mace and Mira’s conjured torchlight coming from just beyond the demon. My knees were shaking from fear. None of us could take our wide eyes off the demon. I could sense that it used some sort of magic to do it somehow, but I couldn’t push the fear away. It seemed to enjoy the fear it instilled in us and used the light to keep its profile dark in front except for its glowing, red eyes, heightening the effect.

  “Say, younglings, how long do you think it will be before your light runs out?” the demon asked, almost politely.

  I had no intention of letting that happen. Bran prayed for courage beside me, and began to glow with a soft, golden light. The worst of the fear retreated, thank goodness. Elle and I shared a grim look with Bran, whose forehead was glowing in the shape of a small, upraised sword inside his helm. The prize we came for was in that center eye of debris, and no one had a doubt that we would be fighting to get it. The lives of everyone in Stonekeep depended on it. The demon saw the look of us and knew we would not give in to the fear it projected. It seemed a little disappointed, or maybe wary was the right word.

  “Why don’t you come on over and put my torch out,” I said with a bravado I wasn’t really feeling.

  There was another pause as the demon considered, then it advanced on us very slowly as it spoke. “You have rightly divined that I cannot leave this place, youngling. Maybe we can work out a deal. No one has to die today. I want freedom from this place, and you want that wretched relic over there. You also won’t be able to move that block to gain your own freedom without me.” The demon stalked up to the very edge of the cleaned area and swiped its sword-like left claw across an invisible barrier, drawing sparks. I could sense the magic of the sparks, but not of the barrier for some reason. Maybe it was priestly magic. “See? I’m stuck. You’re stuck. What do you say?”

  We unconsciously backed away a step or two when the demon had come close. It still had the chain with the block on the end, and I realized that it could swing or hurl that thing into any corner of the room. Bran must have had similar thoughts.

  “How can you be freed?” Bran asked. He was probably stalling for time as he considered.

  “By defacing a rune of power on the far side of that pile of debris. I cannot go there. I’ve been here for centuries, and I am starved and weak. I just want to go home,” the demon said plaintively. Well, as pitiably as a nine-foot tall, horned monstrosity could say something plaintively.

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  I moved to the right, further from the staircase, trying to get a clear line of sight to the debris pile in the center of the room. It looked to be about a thirty-foot distance to the edge of the debris closest to me.

  “I doubt that’s all you want,” Bran said.

  The demon, which was within five feet of Bran and towered over him by at least three feet, said, “Would it be such a bad thing? You need me to move the stone blocking the door. We are trapped here together, you see. I could move over there to give you plenty of room. You wouldn’t be within twenty feet of me then. If you deface the ward, I’ll move the block and leave in peace, and you’ll be free to search for your relic. I’ll want to be long gone before you could use it on me, after all. What say you?”

  Bran considered. “This is a trick somehow. No deal,” he said firmly, keeping his shield at the ready.

  The demon’s eyes glowed a brighter red and its fanged mouth pulled down into a frown. “You’re sure?”

  “I’m sure. We’ll go another route. One that doesn’t free you to inflict untold harm on others,” Bran said.

  “Maybe you’re worthy of that blade after all,” the demon grated out softly. “Very well. The die is cast, as they say. You’ve proven to be entertaining for a little while at least, but even I grow weary of playing with my food.”

  “The barrier protects us,” Elle said.

  A sly and evil grin spread across the fiend’s tusked face. “What barrier?”

  Suddenly the demon sprang forward and slashed upward at Bran with the sword-like claw on its right forearm, which rent Bran’s cuirass and sent him spinning through the air. Bran slammed against the wall close to the blocked entrance, fell to the floor, and didn’t move.

  “Bran!” Elle screamed.

  The demon threw back its head and roared in triumph. An evil grin was on its face as it turned to look at Elle. Clearly, she would be next. I could sense it redouble its efforts with the aura of fear it projected, but we were still safe. Did that mean Bran was still alive?

  After a display like that, I thought our only chance was in finding the sword as fast as possible. I hoped Mira was someplace close to it. I turned from the demon and focused my will, drawing more power from the source. I caused a concussive blast to emerge from my right fist and blast apart the debris in the center of the room. Dirt and small rocks were launched in an arc to pelt the far wall. From somewhere in the room, a crossbow bolt streaked out of the darkness and stuck in the demon’s scaly left shoulder. It snarled in pain, its grip on the chain loosening. Without warning, the chain animated itself and wrapped itself around the demon’s legs a half dozen times in the span of a second. The stone block was dragged across the floor with a grinding noise at the demon’s powerful struggles.

  Elle said a prayer, creating a searing light that shot from her hand to strike the demon right in its spiky chest, and it howled in pain. It looked to be about to strike Elle with its free arm, so I ran straight at it. I drew the power I needed and hurled a concussive blast at the demon that knocked it back ten feet to thrash on the floor against its chain. The demon fixed me with a hateful look, and I knew this fight was far from over. The demon crammed the bony blade on its right forearm down through a gap between its legs and the chains, and with a mighty heave, it slashed the chains apart. Meanwhile, Elle had stepped over to Bran. Elle knelt over Bran and light came from her fingers as she healed the bloody wound inside the rent armor. Another crossbow bolt hissed from the darkness and struck the demon in the back, deflecting off its scaly hide harmlessly.

  With as loud a war cry as I could yell out, I charged the demon, mace held high and my shield leading. It brought up a bladed forearm to block, but I still smashed it with my mace with all the strength I could muster. The fiery magic I channeled into the mace exploded around it with sparks and tendrils of flame. I would have felled any man, but my blow barely made the demon flinch. Time to change weapons, I thought. The demon slashed at me with its right arm, which struck my shield with enough force to knock me back a few steps. That blow really jarred my shoulder, but I could still fight with it despite the pain.

  I channeled concussive force into my mace and met it again in battle. The demon was just climbing to its feet as I struck at its head. The energy in my mace blasted its head sideways and knocked off one of its bigger horns. The demon looked at its horn in the dirt, then looked at me and snarled. Uh, oh. I was hoping that blow would have done more, but the demon wasn’t even stunned. The demon regained its balance and with startling speed it spun at me with its sword arms extended. It struck high with its left arm, which I blocked with my shield, and in the same motion it spun to strike low with its right arm, which took me in the left thigh, cleaving right through my armor, making a deep cut. Then the tail clubbed me out of nowhere, knocking me off balance. It had spun all the way around at this point and slashed at me with its left arm again, which I again blocked with my shield, but it still hit me hard enough to knock me off my feet and make me slide ten feet backwards. Pain lanced through my thigh like fire, a pain I was used to. I scrambled to my feet. I was hurt badly and was bleeding freely, but I thought I could still fight. Maybe even long enough for Elle to heal me.

  Thinking of Elle, I spared a glance to Bran and Elle as the demon began to advance on me with that spinning move again. Elle was helping Bran get to his feet when an object came spinning across the floor to stop a dozen feet away from them. It was a war sword with a handle big enough to be used either one or two handed, and through the dirt I could see gold glittering on the hilt. I could spare no more time to look as the demon advanced on me, blades and spikes whirling. I focused my will, drew more power, and suddenly I was standing behind it as it slashed through the place I was standing a moment ago. Its tail whipped through the air with lethal force followed by its arm blades. Confused, the demon looked around for me and saw me just as I smashed it with a concussive blast, which knocked it backwards several feet. It snarled in pain, struggling to remain standing. The talons on its feet scratched the flagstones in a spray of sparks, but it kept its feet under it and instantly readied itself for another charge at me.

  Without warning, Mira appeared from the darkness behind the monstrosity, and thrust hard at the backsides of its knees, hoping to cripple it. Her sword gave out a metallic rasp as it slid across the demon’s hide. With inhuman speed, the demon stopped the charge it was about to make, spun in place, and whipped its tail and both arm blades in rapid succession at Mira, but she had already leapt backwards and disappeared into the darkness. I hurled a blast of concussive force at the demon, battering it again. It then ignored Mira, knowing I was the bigger threat.

  The demon roared in frustration and as it roared, suddenly I was facing three of them. An illusion! Which one was it really? All three of them sprang forward, straight at me. Despite my wounded leg, I tried to block and dodge to the left and maybe avoid two of them. My plan was to take the fight away from Bran and Elle to give them a few more moments to recover and rejoin the fray. I tried blocking the wrong one. The demon was very fast, and it tackled me from my right side and bore me to the ground in its spiked embrace. Thankfully, I was still turning, and my shield took the brunt of the blow. The fiend was strong enough that spikes from its chest pressed through the metal and wood of my shield, missing my shield arm by less than an inch. It roared in my face as it sensed my weakness. The spikes scratched and dented my cuirass with shrieks of protest from the steel, seeking my heart.

  “Show it to me!” the demon roared at me. We were eye to eye, and I could see hellfire swirling in its eyes. The demon’s foul breath hit me in the face where the helm didn’t cover, and the stench left me unsure of which end of its digestive tract I was facing. I put all my strength into pushing the demon off my chest with my shield and used my right arm in that effort. It was incredibly heavy and was actively trying to squeeze its spikes through my armor. Right then, I knew I wouldn’t succeed. My time was short.

  “There it is…” the demon purred out. Was it talking about my fear? The hopelessness it must have seen in my eyes?

  Snarling at it, I made up my mind right then that no demon would be my end. Not this day. I would fight! I gritted my teeth with the effort it took, but I managed to punch it with the pommel of my mace, then hurl a blast of fire directly in its face and up towards the ceiling. It snarled and kept trying to impale me, unbothered by the fire roaring in its face. It reared its head back and quickly brought it back down, as if to head-butt me, but instead turned slightly. I saw the pointy end of the horn coming straight for my eye and only barely managed to turn my head enough that the horn glanced off my visor, which saved my life.

  From the shadows Mira suddenly appeared, standing over the demon. She thrust her shortsword at the base of the demon’s neck. The blow was very precise and would have dropped a man instantly, but it barely scratched through the demon’s hide. The demon twisted, looking back at Mira, then vomited up a stream of brownish bile. Mira threw up an arm, which saved her eyes, but the filth covered her upper torso and even sprayed onto Elle where she was praying, breaking her concentration. The filth was so awful it made both Elle and Mira gag and reflexively draw back. I cursed as I struggled, knowing it only needed a few seconds to finish me off. I tried to whoosh myself free, but only ended up taking both myself and the demon thirty feet away from the others. We struggled for a few more seconds, but the demon was winning, and was grinning evilly as it did it. I was in real trouble.

  Then I suddenly saw a pure golden light erupt into being, and the demon shuddered from a strong blow. When the demon turned its head to look at the source of its pain, I got a look also. Bran had taken up the holy sword, which blazed with light, and hacked at the demon’s back, shearing through spikes easily and carving huge, smoking wounds. The fiend howled in agony as the holy light seemed to do it grievous harm. It struggled to get up and get away, which pulled my shield and gauntlet right off my arm, breaking one of the straps. The demon sprang away in three different directions, two of which were illusory.

  Bran looked like an avenging angel, aglow with golden light, with the brighter light of the relic in his forehead lighting up the inside of his helm. He could see which of the images was real, and he struck the demon again, shearing off a few spikes from its left shoulder. It slashed wildly in return, but Bran leapt back, narrowly avoiding the slashing attacks. He struck it again, this time with a piercing thrust into its abdomen, which sank in deeply before withdrawing it for another attack. The demon roared continually as it delivered lightning-fast strikes, but it was weakening finally, and it stood with shaking legs as it hammered at Bran’s shield. Somehow, Bran not only took the blows on his shield without being flung away, but struck right back at the demon, cleaving through spines and flesh alike on its left arm with the fiercely glowing holy sword.

  Elle spoke a prayer, stretched out her hand, and struck the demon with a ray of light, hitting it right in its glowing eyes. The flesh on its face sizzled as the demon roared and clutched at its eyes, moving quickly backward. I whooshed away, still prone, and reappeared close to Elle. Bran leapt forward and rammed his sword right through the side of its chest, driving the blade inside to the hilt right next to where my shield was still stuck. With a final shriek and slash of its talons against plate armor, the demon’s body turned to ash and collapsed to the flagstones in a stinking, smoking heap. My shield landed on the pile and scattered the ashes further, adding to the dust cloud the battle generated. The very air down here tasted like dung and sulfur. I just laid there on the ground, breathing heavily. My leg burned like fire, and I felt blood soaking my padded pants.

  “You gonna lay there all day?” Bran called out as he walked over.

  “Yeah,” I said, gritting my teeth. “Now that I think about it, I don’t think I want to walk the four days it’ll take to get to that stupid city. I like it here.” My words rang hollow even to me, but at least my sarcasm wasn’t lost. The pain in my leg made concentrating on conversation difficult. I could hear someone spitting repeatedly a short distance away, but saw mostly darkness as my vision narrowed. I was losing a lot of blood.

  “Elle!,” Bran said as he caught Elle’s eye and pointed at my leg, but she was already drawing close. Elle knelt next to me and whispered a prayer of healing. Light came from her hands, which she placed on my leg, and the pain ceased. My shoulder felt better, too.

  I groaned lightly as I collected myself. I was going to live. “Thanks, Elle,” I said sincerely. I rested a little until my breathing slowed, and then channeled enough power to fix the slashes in my pants and then my cuisses. Then I started working on the other parts of my cuirass and vambraces that were rent and dented.

  Bran held out a hand and helped me up. “You all right?” Bran asked as I struggled to my feet.

  “Yeah, I’m good,” I said. “Thanks.”

  “You mind?” He pointed at his ruined cuirass.

  “What? You can’t fix it yourself, Mr. Smith?” Without waiting for an answer, I took power from the source and repaired his gambeson and cuirass, then I did the same thing to repair my ruined shield. It was as good as new. I put on my lost gauntlet and finally felt a bit more in control.

  Mira stepped out of the shadows with Bandit close by and spat on the floor. “Ugh. It’s in my mouth!” She must have been talking about the stuff the demon spewed on her. I could have sworn I heard a tiny snicker from Bandit just then, but I decided I must have imagined it. Aside from trying to get rid of the taste, there wasn’t a trace of the putrid vomit left on her.

  “That was a close one. You guys all right?” Elle asked.

  Bran, Mira and I all replied that we were fine.

  “That sure is a heavy looking block,” Mira said as she considered the ruined doorway. There was only an inch or two of clearance between the block and the floor because of the crushed stone still in the way of it completely resting on the flagstones. “Almost as thick as Jeron’s skull.”

  I refused to rise to the bait. “I can whoosh us out, no problem,” I said. “Hey, how’d Bandit get in here? I thought she was in the bushes outside before the slab fell.”

  “Raccoons are super sneaky,” Mira said evasively, then changed the subject. “We should search the place. Maybe the demon had some treasure squirreled away.”

  “Yeah, may as well,” I said.

  “Mira, can you hit us with that cleaning spell you know? Bran is so entranced with his new sword that he’s forgotten to ask,” Elle said, holding her arms out to her sides, indicating the filthy state she was in.

  “Huh?” Bran said, eyes locked on the sword. The sword was now glowing a lot less brightly, but still glowing.

  Mira stepped over and magically cleaned Elle up, then did the same thing with all of our padding and armor. “I used to practice with this spell when I was first learning magic. It’s really come in handy since then.”

  We had a look at the holy sword out of curiosity. It had a three-foot-long blade that was made of divinium, which was a bright white metal, and was known to be a very light but strong metal. The blade looked extremely sharp, and it had an inscription running the length of it that said “Vengeance.” The hilt of the sword was gilded in gold and had large pearls inlaid into the guard. The grip was big enough for two handed use and was made of gold wire wrapped very tightly. The sword glowed with a golden light when Bran held it. I had the feeling it would be glowing a lot as we walked to that red roofed city, as Bran didn’t have a scabbard for it currently.

  “All right, let’s spread out and look for shiny stuff,” Mira said excitedly. She spat again.

  She was always single-minded when thinking about treasure. I didn’t really care about money all that much. To me it was a tool and was only as good as the things you could do with it, but other people seemed to value it quite a bit. To keep the peace, I started looking around anyway. It wasn’t long before Mira cried out in triumph. She had found a loose flagstone near the wall furthest from the stairs and pried it up with the tip of her shortsword. Within was a small pile of gold and silver coins with a few copper coins scattered about. It looked like a few hundred coins in all, and Mira quickly put them into her helmet.

  “We’ll split it up when we get out of here,” Mira said.

  “This place gives me the creeps,” Elle said. “I’ll be happy to leave this place behind.”

  “That makes two of us,” I said. “Does everyone have all their gear?”

  There were affirmative answers to that. Bandit climbed up onto Mira’s pauldron. Mira made a grimace.

  “You’re so heavy,” Mira groaned. “How many honey buns ’ve you eaten lately?”

  Bandit gave an indignant huff and climbed across Mira’s arm to my shoulder when Mira placed her hand on my pauldron, and Mira gave an exaggerated sigh of relief. Bran and Elle laid a hand on my other shoulder, and with a little concentration and a bit of power, I whooshed us all up to the surface close to our packs. Despite the terror below, it was a nice, sunny Twoday and it was only mid-morning.

  “We can get a lot of ground covered today if we hustle,” Bran said.

  From our perch on the hill in the ruins, we could see a long way to the south and west. The red tiled city looked like it was maybe four days of marching away. I paid attention to the direction the hills ran, which looked like it was due south to the sea. The city was more to the west, though.

  “What do you think?” I asked Bran.

  “There’s probably a stream we can follow to the sea. That’s about a day or two’s march. Then three days west as long as the terrain isn’t so bad,” Bran said.

  “And as long as we don’t die from some random monster’s attack,” Mira said.

  Mira dumped the coins out of her helmet into a pile on a large flagstone and started dividing up the spoils. It ended up being the equivalent of around a hundred and forty gold coins worth of gold, silver and copper coins for each of us. I struggled to add the figures in my head. With the money we got from the goblins, we had about three hundred and forty gold coins each. I put my share of the coins in my backpack, then picked up my pack. The others were doing the same, and off we went. This would make a good story to tell one day, I thought.

  Elle and Mira moved to march behind Bran, so I cleared my throat loudly. They stopped and gave me a quizzical look. “If you don’t mind, I’ll walk upwind of you two.”

  Bran tilted his head as he began marching. Though he was wearing a helm, I could tell he was smirking by the way he held his head. He was too wise to give voice to a wisecrack, but I knew he was thinking it. For their part, the ladies let me march in front of them with only sour expressions. This was definitely going to be a long march. To amuse myself, I began thinking of funny ways to relate this story to my family when we got back. Assuming we all made it back, that is. And assuming there was a place to go back to.