The globe of white flame descends to earth. It fades, leaving Alua, Sharadza, and myself amid the tall grass. Cool winds rustle my robe, and the honest scent of wet earth fills my nostrils.
Like the burial mounds of lost Kings the seven hillocks rise about us. Dense thickets of thornwhistle and starflower grow upon their crowns. Toppled obelisks of worn granite lie here and there between the mounds, covered by emerald moss and purple lichen. The blocks are so old that only the faintest remnants of glyphs and sigils are visible in the pitted stone.
“What is this place?” Sharadza asks.
“It has no name,” I say. “Rather its name has been lost for ages. These crumbling stones were once the foundation of a metrop olis older than any on this continent.”
I walk between the obelisks, touching each of them in turn. Some are merely the remnants of foundation stones that once supported walls as large as those of Udurum or Uurz. My touch extends through the porous rock into the soil beneath. It is not long before I find the one for which I am searching. I mumble a word of power and the slab rises from the loam to float in the damp air. Tendrils of moss and creeper vine hang from it, dripping rainwater into the rectangular hole that has been revealed.
“Come,” I say. Sharadza and Alua follow me down the ancient steps into the womb of the earth. The concealing obelisk lowers itself behind us, sealing the entryway once again. The blue flame gutters on my chest, turning the rough-hewn walls from dirty brown to shades of azure. The light is not enough for Alua, so she conjures another white flame to dance in her palm. Sharadza keeps her silence as we descend.
At a certain depth the crevices of the stairwell are still filled with black sand from the desert that used to lie above. Sigils and hieroglyphs run along the walls in clever patterns. Another dead language, this one inscribed in stone. A human skull lies in a corner where the stairwell turns in another direction. The smells of fungi and rotted bones prevail here; there is only darkness outside our sphere of pale bluish light.
At last we reach the bottom of the long stair and enter a grand cavern. A forest of eight-sided pillars stands carved from floor-to-ceiling stalagmites. Nameless ciphers and icons swirl across the surface of these columns. The floor is of natural stone as well, yet graven smooth except for faded murals and cryptographs. I remember this place full of light and life, but it is the blurred memory of a dream that might or might not have been real.
My companions follow me into the depths of the pillared vault. We stop at the mouth of a great, dry well encircled by runes that I recognize. The marks of protective sorcery. Standing above the dark shaft, I sing the notes of an ancient song. My voice echoes among the pillars, travels across the dusty floor, and sinks into the well. By the time my song is done, twenty pairs of yellow eyes stare at us from the darkness between the pillars.
The Nameless Folk have us surrounded.
They creep forward, silent as cats. Curved blades glimmer in their fists. Dark veils cover the lower half of their faces, and hoods hide the tops of their heads. They offer us only the glare of their reptilian eyes. Some carry loaded crossbows of dark wood. I am surprised to see such recent advancements in weaponry here.
Alua’s white flame surges but a glance from me dispels her alarm. Sharadza stands against my shoulder. I can almost feel the questions lingering on her tongue. She has learned to be patient; a necessary trait for any sorcerer.
“Vaazhia.” I address them with the name of their creator. It is the only word I need to say. One of them motions me forward. I walk in the direction indicated by his raised blade. Sharadza takes Alua’s hand and reaches for my own. The thick gloves are gone now, and her touch is a pleasant heat in my grasp.
We pass through an archway guarded by two stone demons with chipped teeth and empty eye sockets where great jewels once sat. The Nameless Folk enclose us, part escorts, part guards. They lead us on without voices (for they have none) through shadowed galleries and twisting hallways, always downward into the earth by stone ramp and stairway. We navigate a narrow ledge, pressing our backs against cobwebbed stone and glancing into an abyss of windblown darkness. More stairwells await us beyond the gulf, and we come at last to a massive cavern with a river running swift through its middle. An arcing bridge of stone carries us over the whitewater; tall torches along its length blaze with orange light, despite the clouds of wet mist rising from below. This must be the same waterway that runs beneath the palace of Uurz, or at least one of the Sacred River’s tributaries. On the far side, another arch accepts us and a corridor leads us into a realm of dancing flames.
The walls of a great hall glisten with constellations of raw diamonds. Braziers of ancient iron burn hot with the leaping flames. Hundreds more of the Nameless Folk mill about the polished floor, peering from behind columns of green beryl and yellow quartz. All of them wear the veils that show only their yellow eyes, and they are all so very similar. There are no children or young ones among them, as there are no elderly. This does not surprise me.