The Road To Kalbakar, Wyrms of Pasandir #1

CHAPTER 9 - JEM'S BOTTLE (Part Two)

At the crypt's entrance, we stopped.

'The seals have been broken,' she said angrily. 'Who has dared to disturb the Tombs of Kings?'

'Not me,' Naudin said. 'Supervisor Lyster was searching for evidence down there. He hoped to prove these ruins are Atnortod.'

'Of course they are,' the girl said haughtily. 'Anyone could have told him that.'

'Anyone who could has been dead five hundred years.'

Her mask of arrogance shattered and left her a scared young girl. 'Not only we're dead, but forgotten? Nanstalgarod was so rich, so powerful. Now people don't even know we existed?'

'I'm sorry,' I said. 'At least you can tell the world how it was. Make them remember.'

She glanced at me and nodded.

Naudin put a hand to the open door and closed his eyes. 'Magic!' he said immediately. 'Old magic and a lot of it.' He looked at us. 'But no Lyster. I don't feel any life down there.'

'For a crypt, that's good,' I said, trying to lighten the mood.

Naudin gave a snorting laugh. 'It's lunchtime. Perhaps Lyster is still in the camp. Let's be quick; we don't wanna be here when he comes back; he's one heck of a jealous cat over his findings.' He produced a tiny mage light and walked inside.

At the bottom of the stairs was a hall, with a room to the left. All was dark, but there hung a smell of hot wax in the air.

'That's where grandfather has his sarcophagus,' the girl said. 'There used to be candles burning everywhere.'

Without thought, I made my own light, a little flame that burned without visible fuel. 'Jemja...' Too much name, I thought. 'Jem.'

'What?' Her eyebrows shot almost into her elaborate coiffure.

'I'll call you Jem,' I said firmly. 'Much easier. Do you mind?'

'N-no,' she said. 'It's what my father called me.'

'Sorry,' I said, all at once feeling boorish.

'No, it's fine. I like it,' Jem said. 'My dad was a good man. Grandfather killed him.'

Naudin and I both stared at her.

'Jolly fellow, your grandfather,' I said.

'I said he was mad.' She flicked her wrists in a curiously fatalistic gesture. 'The sand had killed his mind long before the end.'

I walked over to the stone coffin, with the lid lying beside it. Then I stopped.

'Naudin,' I said hesitantly.

'Hmm?' The mage was still in the hallway, inspecting a cupboard full of treasure, while I was looking at something else, at two booted feet sticking up from the coffin.

'Naudin!' I repeated, more urgently. He turned around and I beckoned to him.

He sauntered over. 'What's up?'

I pointed at the coffin and the blood drained from his face.

'Oh gods,' he said, and his voice shook. 'Is he...?'

I looked inside the coffin. 'I'd say he is. Do you know him?'

Naudin stared at me, his eyes big. 'They're Lyster's boots.'

'But is it Lyster wearing them?' I said inexorably.

He swallowed and cast a quick glance inside. Then he nodded.