The Wicked Beckons

The Library

The walls that had been carved out of solid stone seemed to watch a girl from the surface world, stalking her every move. The girl wore clothes stitched from animal hides, a collection of light brown furs. Her dark, amber skin and brown eyes made it apparent that she was one of the people of the valley. A member of the tribe of Yandekai.

The girl, an orphan named Dayla, kept her eyes focused on the sharp-edged stairs which she stepped downwards on. She didn't want to look up at the walls, knowing how ancient they must have been. "So ancient, they may be alive," as her mentor once said.

Lit dimly by the torch lamps hanging from the ceiling, the symbols on the stone did not look at her either. The depictions of ancestral man, the first ancestors, averted their gazes from visitors, as they had for millennia. Some were depictions of woman bowing their heads to an ocean sky, raising bowls up to catch the falling waters. Others were of men stacked upon one another in pyramid formations to breach the waves above the clouds. All of them remained stagnant, locked in a timeless stillness. But both the girl and the symbols were slightly curious the other, glancing with a peripheral focus of vision.

Although the feeling of being watched by supposedly inanimate carvings grew more eerie with every step, Dayla continued down the staircase. Somewhere at the bottom, the Keep of the Scribes resided. It was a holy place, one that was forbade anyone who did not have the Shamana's blessing to enter.

Only the Shamana, a master of magical arts, held the authority to speak for the ancestor spirits. Fortunately, Dayla's mentor was, in fact, the Shamana herself. The old woman gave her permission to go to the Keep, but only to look at one of the myriad of scrolls kept within. Dayla accepted her mentor's condition. She only wanted to look at one of the records: the travel logs of her deceased father.

Upon stepping onto the cold, uneven ground floor of the keep, a chill swept through the room. The dim torch lights brightened as if to acknowledge Dayla's presence. Before her, a long hallway with shelves indented in the walls invited her to find the scroll which she sought.

Being the curious child she was, Dayla took her time examining every shelf, brushing her fingers against paper older than anyone she knew, even the Shamana. There were tales of heroes, monsters, victories, defeats, tyrants, kings, all of it written down for Dayla's people to read about and remember. But only one record interested her. A small scroll near the end of the hall with an inscription on it that read "Ilheim's Last Campaign."

"Father." She whispered breathlessly. Opening the scroll, she gazed in awe at Ilheim's handwriting, as if she had stumbled upon an ancient creature trapped in amber. The combination of letters and pictographs captured her attention, and she began to read with care, taking her time to decipher every word.