“Lord Mendices,” said a smooth voice. “Come with me.” The man pulled back his hood to reveal a handsome face. He was middle-aged, and his features spoke of Uurzian blood. His dark hair was oiled slick and his beard was tied into six braids secured with gold rings. Jewels glittered on his fingers, and he wore the gilded sandals of a highborn lord.
Mendices staggered to his feet. His legs were weak from lack of exercise; the cell’s ceiling was too low to allow for more than a standing crouch. He did not recognize the visitor at all, but it did not matter if he was executioner or liberator. Any chance to leave the cubicle, even if it meant walking to his death, was preferable to lingering a moment longer among the filthy straw and rat droppings. The stranger dropped the keys into a pouch at his belt. He offered Mendices an arm to steady himself.
“Who are you?” Mendices asked. He became suddenly aware that his beard and hair were matted and overlong, his nobleman’s robes reeking and stained.
“Consider me a friend of the late Sword King,” said the stranger. “One who was as dedicated to his cause as yourself. I come with a message from Lord Aeldryn, who fled the city upon your arrest. You may call me Thaxus.”
Aeldryn? If that one had fled the city, then Mendices knew the lords Rolfus and Dorocles must have absconded as well. Along with Mendices they had been the chief captains of Tyro’s Gold Legions. Now they were scattered, flying far from Lyrilan’s vengeance.
Thaxus helped Mendices walk the corridor of raw stone past the rows of empty cells on either side. “Lord Aeldryn’s message is this,” said Thaxus, clearing his throat. “ ‘Hail, Mendices, my Brother of the Gold. I cannot aid you directly. Yet the wizard Thaxus is beholden to me and will serve you well. The future of our noble cause will soon lie in your hand. Follow Thaxus now and trust in my word.’ That is all.”
Mendices saw that he had only two choices: Trust Aeldryn via Thaxus, or return to the miserable cell and wait for a death that might be far too long in coming. It was no choice at all.
“Where are you taking me?” Mendices asked. Thaxus led him by the elbow up the stairs at the end of the corridor. Here the smells of human waste and suffering were replaced by the scents of deep earth and ancient stone. Somewhere above lay the splendor of the palace halls.
“Heed the words of Aeldryn and have faith in me,” said Thaxus. Mendices asked him no more questions. Soon the prisoner was able to walk on his own, and the stairs had brought them to an intersection of subterranean passages. Mendices followed Thaxus into a labyrinth of corridors, stairwells, and vaulted chambers of granite with little decoration. In a short time he was lost in the catacombs, and only regained his sense of direction when they reached the threshold of the royal crypts. Thaxus’ torch guttered, shedding orange light across wall niches filled with sarcophagi and tomb-galleries where generations of royal corpses slumbered beneath the golden lids of a thousand coffins. The smell of ancient rot filled the dusty air.
Thaxus led him into the lowest levels of the crypts, where the most ancient of skeletons had fallen from their niches and mildewed sarcophagi had long ago vomited up piles of bones. Hollow-eyed skulls watched Mendices, and the walls were crusted with nitre, the ceiling sharp with dripping stalactites.
There must be some hidden exit in this forsaken maze of death.
Mendices followed his guide without question. At last Thaxus paused before a great door of black stone. Its edges had been sealed centuries ago, and runes of ancient power were carved across its obsidian face. Despite the portal’s impassable appearance, Thaxus waved a hand before it and uttered a few words, causing it to swing open with a gravelly groan. The ceiling trembled, raining dust and cobwebs. Mendices coughed and followed Thaxus into the musty chamber beyond.
The tomb was an oval room with a flat floor and ceiling. A single sarcophagus of white stone sat on a pedestal at its center, carven into the life-sized image of an armored warrior in repose. The dust of ages lay about the place, and the coffin was adorned with inset rubies, emeralds, and purple agates. A tomb-robber’s dream, this forgotten sepulcher. Yet Mendices’ eyes were drawn instantly from the jeweled sarcophagus toward the room’s true treasure.
It lay horizontally upon a double-pronged stand at the head of the coffin. A longblade of ancient make, sheathed in a scabbard of scaly black Serpent-skin encrusted with gray pearls. The sword’s iron handle had been dipped in gold, its pommel shaped into an eagle’s talon clutching a great fire opal.
Thaxus walked near to the blade but did not touch it. He faced Mendices and held his glowing torch above the sword. “Behold: Earthfang, the Blade of Gyron the Protector, greatest warrior of the First Century.”