“Now hold up a minute, I’m sure this is all some sort of a misunderstanding,” Ankh said. “You said something about a creature in Milinia? Would you care to explain to me what that is about?”
Mirgia narrowed his eyes, Kimi hovering a safe distance behind him now. He had not yet removed his knife from Ankh’s throat, but he also got the feeling that the threat wasn’t having the impact it should have, as if Ankh was not feeling in danger whatsoever.
“Last harvest festival, a witch attacked our town with a similar magic summoning a fiery creature like the one you just took out. And prior to that, one of my friends was also hurt badly by another similar creature. We have been chasing leads on this magic ever since and now you dare show yourself in front of us, casually casting ancient magic.”
Ankh listened intently to Mirgia, which only served to irritate him more. “I see, that explains the hostile reaction.” He flicked his wrist and Mirgia’s knife went flying off into the distance. With a glare on his face he looked at Mirgia. “I understand your anger but if you point a weapon at me again I will leave no trace of you, do you understand me?”
Mirgia felt the force behind the comment and suddenly realized that the eyes in Ankh’s face looked more like voids to him than eyes. He blinked and the sorcerer’s face was back to normal. An illusion?
“Then explain yourself, for I did not point my weapon in your direction without good reason.” Mirgia had lost his weapon now but he held steadfast, knowing that cowering now would be a sign of weakness.
Ankh motioned with his hand again and the other two Sahilid fighters that had accompanied him each sheathed their weapons. “I suppose things down here will go easier if I explain myself.” He took out his book again and showed some of the pages to Mirgia, flipping through it. Each page had drawings of a magical circle on them, but they all looked slightly different. They had different rings, just like the ones they’d encountered before, but there were also much simpler ones and even one that stood out because it looked far more intricate and difficult to draw than the others. “The magic of drawing these circles is a relic from the flying city of Kanarth. I assume this explains to you why myself and the emperor are so interested in finding out more about the city. When I was younger, I took on several apprentices, some of which I even taught this magic to. One of these apprentices was a young woman who at the time went by Adaine Solin, although I believe she goes by many different names. After I taught her the basics of my magic, we each went our separate ways. I suspect that this woman was the one that went after your town.”
“So you are essentially responsible for what happened in Milinia?”
“Is the martial artist responsible for the acts of his students? Is the swordfighter responsible for the actions of his protegé?”
This gave Mirgia pause. Kimi fluttered back onto his shoulder. “And how do we know you’re not involved with what this woman is doing?”
Ankh chuckled. “You’re just going to have to take my word for it. Besides – and I mean this with all due respect – if you wish to exact any kind of revenge I would suggest you let it go for now. I have no intention to hurt any of you as you have not given me any reason to do so, but know that I could wipe out everyone in this room with my eyes closed.” There was a truth to Ankh’s words that made Mirgia’s hairs on the back of his neck stand up. He nodded. “Very well, let’s drop the subject until we’re back above ground.”
Ankh smiled. “If you prove to be of use during this excursion I will gladly take you back to the capital and tell you what I know of Adaine. I have no obligations towards her either way and I taught her how to fend for herself well enough.”
“I’ll keep you to that promise.”
It wouldn’t take long after leaving the room with the raised platforms before they found the first body. Mirgia didn’t remember the name of the person, but it clearly belonged to one of the Sahilid adventurers that continued deeper into the dungeon after Mirgia and his party headed back outside. Mirgia confirmed to Ankh that this was one of the members of their previous group and after checking for wounds they moved on. It looked like one of those insectoid creatures got to this particular person and there was no real need to keep investigating past that. If Ankh was to be believed, they were in a hurry to stop whatever might be happening further down in the dungeon. They came through another room not much later, where signs of blood covered the room. There were no bodies here which was peculiar. Two doors led onwards, a trail of blood leading towards the left door. It was a small trail, likely from a cut of sorts, but nothing truly horrendous. After a moment of discussion they traveled into that door. At the end of a long hallway, they found a staircase down. The circular staircase seemed to go on forever and before they made it halfway down, the trail of blood had stopped already. There were still no bodies, so perhaps no one died during whatever they encountered in the previous room? The eeriness of the situation didn’t help Mirgia’s tension and the air was getting more and more stale as they went down, making it difficult to breathe well. After what felt like hours, but was probably closer to forty minutes, the group of six made it down to the bottom of the staircase where a hallway similar to the one they traveled through at the top of the stairs appeared. Towards the end of the tunnel was a light and as they got to the end, they were faced with a sight completely beyond anything else they could have possibly expected.
Five bodies were slowly turning the shallow layer of water that was laying in the room into a red shade as their blood mingled with the stale water. At the far end of the room, the mixture of blood and water funneled through a trough into a carved magical circle that was slowly filling up. Standing next to the circle was the one surviving member of Danil’s group of priests, now showing nothing of the calm devotion to Owlana that was a carefully crafted part of his demeanor before. The man had taken off his robes, revealing a body scarred by flames with a large chunk of one of his forearms completely missing, exposing the bone below it. From a cut in his hand, more blood flowed into the watery mixture on the ground. Laying on the ground next to him was one of the surviving Sahalid members, Fezel. Fezel was one of the two women that he encountered in the Green house for tall folk when he first arrived in Redsan. Both Salandi and Krashid were attacking what seemed like the air, but was probably a magical barrier of sorts.
Paralyzed by the uncertainty of what to do, Mirgia stood there for a few moments before darting after Kimi who was more clear of mind. Ankh and his people walked towards the ritual as well, although there seemed to be very little sense of urgency to their pace.
“Isn’t this really bad?” Karal asked Ankh.
Ankh nodded. “Yeah, this looks pretty serious.”
“Then shouldn’t you do something about it?”
Ankh shrugged. “It’s probably not going to be bad for me, and I’m quite curious to see what will happen next.”
“You’re insane,” Karal replied, with his eyes wide open.
Ankh’s eyes dimmed and several floating gemstones appeared circling around his head. “Tell me something I don’t know.” He pushed Karal off to the side and walked forward towards Mirgia and Kimi. “I can help you stop this ritual, but you’ll owe me,” he said.
Mirgia glared at the sorcerer. “You came down here knowing something like this might happen, didn’t you?”
Ankh shrugged. “I’m not involved with what is happening here, I’m just here to do recon for my emperor. I don’t mind helping you, but it won’t be for free.”
Mirgia weighed his options. Things were looking quite desperate and although Kimi had access to some powerful magic, he didn’t know if she would be able to make it past this magical barrier. It looked like Fezel was still alive as she was moving ever so slightly despite blood trickling from one of her wounds. Mirgia saw the desperation in Salandi’s eyes. “Fine, please help us.”
Ankh condescendingly patted him on the shoulder. “As you wish.”
Opal Kaharis 